From the unearthed Chu figurines in the Warring States period, we can see that there were already powders, thrushes and rouge used at that time. The word "greased powder and makeup" first appeared in Han Feizi Xianxue, which shows that there were "series" cosmetics more than 2,2 years ago. Ancient agricultural society has always been self-sufficient, even cosmetics are no exception. Most of them are made of natural plants, animal fats and spices through boiling, fermentation, filtration and other steps. In comparison, ancient women were less fortunate than today's women. They had no ready-made and dazzling cosmetics to choose from, but this did not weaken their willingness to dress up.
Then, let's take a look at what treasures are usually put in front of the dressing table of ancient women, and briefly introduce the three most commonly used magic weapons:
Makeup powder. The powder materials rubbed by the ancients were mostly selected from "rice flour". In addition to rice flour, there was also lead powder. Generally, white lead is turned into paste-like facial fat, which is sucked dry, ground into powder or made into a solid shape, and can be painted into a big white face when used. Although it is toxic, it seems that women are even risking their lives to "cover up all the ugliness with white", and they do not hesitate to take a small amount of arsenic every day to achieve the whitening effect from the inside out.
powder on the face was called Fu powder in ancient times. In ancient China, women used powder for a long time, which has always been the most common way to make up. According to the records of the Tang Dynasty, the powder fee that Tang Minghuang rewarded to Yang Guifei's sisters every year was as high as one million taels! Li Yu, a dramatist in the early Qing Dynasty, had a very original view on the method of Fu Fen. He thought that women's powder application at that time "had a tendency to be subservient to the trend, and the beauties used it to enhance their beauty", "white people can make it white again" and "adding white to black is to make it black", which clearly revealed the relationship between makeup and aesthetics. What is more worth pondering is that the ancients also associated makeup methods such as Fu powder with moral cultivation, pointing out that beauty should be combined with self-cultivation. For example, Cai Yong in the Eastern Han Dynasty thought: "Taking photos to wipe the face means thinking about the purity of the heart, Fu powder means thinking about the sum of the heart, adding powder means thinking about the freshness of the heart, Ze Fa means thinking about the smoothness of the heart, using comb means thinking about the reason of the heart, and making a bun means thinking about the righteousness of the heart, and taking a sideburns. This view is not only insightful, but also profound.
daifen. In the Warring States period, there was no material to specify eyebrows, and women burned willow branches and painted them on their eyebrows. Then came "Dai", a navy blue mineral. Before painting, Dai must be put on the inkstone and ground into powder, and then mixed with water.
Thrush is the most popular and common makeup method in China, which was produced in the Warring States Period. Qu Yuan wrote in "The Songs of the South": "White and white, black and white, only giving Fang Ze." "Black" means to use black thrush. In the Han dynasty, thrush became more common, and the more you draw, the better you look. "Miscellanies of Xijing" wrote: "Sima Xiangru's wife, Wen Jun, has an eyebrow that looks like a distant mountain, and she painted a distant eyebrow when she was young." This means painting your eyebrows long, curved and green, as beautiful as a distant mountain. Later, it was developed to use emerald thrush, and it was also very popular in the court. In the Song Dynasty, Yan Jidao described it in Liu Yao Ling: "Come to Cuimei Palace late, and learn from the distant mountains skillfully." "The Story of Mizhuang Terrace" said, "Wei Wudi ordered the imperial court to draw green eyebrows, even the eyebrows, and the painting was very long, which was called fairy makeup." Instead, the use of black eyebrows has become a new thing in the popularity of Cui eyebrows. It is said in Notes on Ancient and Modern China that Yang Guifei "made white makeup with black eyebrows". At that time, people regarded this as a new way of makeup and called it "new makeup". No wonder Xu Ning wrote in his poem: "Once the new makeup is thrown away, the six palaces will struggle to draw black eyebrows."
in the prosperous Tang dynasty, it was popular to draw eyebrows wide and short, shaped like laurel leaves or moth wings. In Yuan Zhen's poem "Don't draw long eyebrows and short eyebrows", and Li He's poem also said that "the new laurel is like a moth eyebrow". In order to make the broad eyebrows not appear dull, women also smudge the color at the edge of the eyebrows evenly when painting them, which is called "smudged eyebrows". Another is to draw eyebrows very thin, which is called "thin eyebrows". Therefore, Bai Juyi has a sentence of "Qingdai has a slender eyebrow" in Shangyang White-haired Man, and also describes it as "but a petal was like her face and a willow-leaf her eyebrow" in Song of Eternal Sorrow. By the time of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty, the forms of thrush were even more colorful, and there were ten kinds of eyebrows: Yuanyang eyebrow, Xiaoshan eyebrow, Wufeng eyebrow, Sanfeng eyebrow, beaded eyebrow, moon eyebrow, split eyebrow, smoke-containing eyebrow, smoke-blowing eyebrow and inverted eyebrow. There are so many paintings on eyebrows alone, which shows that the ancients have a strong love for beauty.
rouge. This thing has existed since Shang Dynasty. It is an ancient lipstick. The raw material is a kind of flower called "red and blue", which can also be used as blush after being blended with makeup powder. Later, people added bovine marrow, pig pancreas and other things to this red pigment, making it a dense grease. Since then, the grease of rouge has a real meaning.
In ancient times, lipstick was called oral fat and lip fat. The red color of oral fat, applied to the lips, can increase the bright color of oral lips and give people a healthy, young and energetic impression, so it has been loved by women since ancient times. The degree of this kind of love can be seen from the Book of the Tang Dynasty, Baiguan Zhi, which states: "On the twelfth day, I offered oral fat, facial fat, head cream and garment sachet, and gave it to the bachelor of Beimen, and the oral fat was filled with a blue tooth tube." It is written here that oral fat is held in carved ivory tubes, which shows how precious oral fat is in many cosmetics!
There are many ways to make up with lip fat. China is used to taking a small mouth as the beauty, that is, "the cherry has a small mouth". For example, Cen Can, a poet in the Tang Dynasty, said in "Drunk Dou Meiren Poems": "The lips are a little peach blossom."
After the year of Tang Chaoyuan, due to the influence of Tibetan costumes and makeup, there appeared "crying makeup" and "tears makeup", which, as the name implies, turned makeup into crying, and was called "contemporary makeup" at that time. Bai Juyi, a poet, once described it in detail in his poem "Contemporary Makeup": "Contemporary makeup, which comes from all directions in the city, is far and near popular, with no ink on the cheeks and no powder on the cheeks. The black paste is like mud on the lips, and the eyebrows are painted in a low figure of eight. The black and white makeup is out of its original state and looks like a sad cry." This kind of makeup is not only unattractive, but also gives people a strange feeling, so it soon goes out of fashion.
In the Tang and Song Dynasties, it was also popular to use sandalwood color to touch lips, and sandalwood color is light crimson color. Qin Guan, a poet in the Northern Song Dynasty, sang in Nan Ge Zi: "Rub your blue shirt and apricot skirt, lean on the jade fence alone, and have no words to touch your lips." This color of oral fat is still popular until modern times. Of course, whether it is vermilion or sandalwood, we should choose and use it appropriately according to different characteristics and conditions of individuals, and we must not take strange fashion as beauty.
In addition to the above-mentioned three commonly used techniques, there are also many special effects of accessories and makeup, such as:
Flower flower
This makeup method, also known as flower flower, face flower and applique, is a small decoration attached to the brow and face.
as for the origin of flower buds, according to Song Gaocheng's Book of Miscellaneous Five Elements quoted from Ji Hou of Things, in the Southern Dynasties, "Princess Shouyang, a female in Song Wudi, was lying under the eaves of the temple with a chapter every day, and plum blossoms fell on her forehead, making five flowers, which could not be brushed away, but fell after three days' washing, and the ladies-in-waiting were strange and competing for results." It is called "plum blossom makeup" or "Shouyang makeup" for some reason.
By the Song Dynasty, plum blossom makeup was still popular. In Drunken Flowers, Wang Zao sang: "The curtain of the boat is open, and the beauty is half exposed to plum blossom makeup, while Lv Yun reflects flowers like an engraving."
it was also in the Tang dynasty that decals became popular. What is the flower bud made of? In ancient times, the materials used to make flower buds were very rich, such as gold foil, paper, fish scales and camellia cakes. The most interesting thing is that even dragonfly wings can be used to make flower buds! For example, "Meng Yi Lu" written by Tao Gu of the Song Dynasty said: "In the late Tang Dynasty, the imperial palace or the net got dragonflies and loved their delicate green, so they painted their wings with gold pens and made small flowers." It can be seen that in ancient times, women's makeup methods were not only rich, but also unique and eclectic. The colors of flower buds are red, green, yellow, etc. In the well-known Mulan Ci, there is a sentence of "putting yellow on the mirror". In addition to the plum blossom shape, there are all kinds of birds, small fish and ducklings, which are very beautiful and novel.
forehead yellow
forehead yellow, also called crow yellow, is painted yellow between the forehead. This kind of makeup is no longer used now. It originated in the Northern and Southern Dynasties and prevailed in the Tang Dynasty. According to "China Women's Adornment", this kind of adornment has a certain relationship with the popularity of Buddhism. During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, Buddhism entered its heyday in China, and some women were inspired by the gold-painted Buddha statues and painted their foreheads yellow, which gradually became a common practice. In the Southern Dynasties, Jian Wendi's "Beautiful Women" said: "About the yellow energy efficiency month, cutting gold and making stars skillfully." About Huang Xiaoyue mentioned here refers to the makeup method of forehead yellow. When the forehead yellow prevailed in the Tang Dynasty, Wen Tingyun recited the sentence of "infinite sunset mountain with forehead yellow" in his poem, and Li Shangyin also wrote: "Princess Shouyang wears makeup when she marries, and the eyebrows in the eight-character palace hold forehead yellow." In the Tang Dynasty, Niu Monk and Ru also specifically described the story of the goddess Zhiqiong who made her forehead yellow. When the forehead yellow was still popular in the Song Dynasty, the poet Peng Ruli sang: "There is a woman who is called a fine mother, and the pearl falls on her temples and is painted yellow." All these reflect the scenes that ancient women liked forehead yellow.
In ancient times, articles containing cosmetics also had a nice name-"dowry". China's dowry culture has a long history. It is known by ancient people that "stop water and identify capacity, bathe in running water", wear Shellmon's tooth ornaments to the neck, "look at the mirror in the morning, and make up your lips at dawn". Tang Zhuqing said in the rest of the poem, "Ask your husband in a low voice after makeup, and the thrush is not deep enough." Everyone has a love of beauty, and it is the same at all times.
in the ancient society, which emphasized that women "can't leave the door, but can't enter the second door", "women are pleasing to themselves" is undoubtedly the greatest pleasure and concern of women. Although the social background, political and economic systems, moral concepts, customs and people's feelings of each dynasty are different, they all have different definitions of beauty. Whether the ring is fat or thin, beautiful or not, depends on people, time and place. Especially in ancient times, women's social status was low, and they were strongly attached to men economically. They were in a poor situation of being chosen by men, having multiple wives and concubines, and competing for favor with each other all their lives. In this case, women want to have more advantages, and the beauty of appearance is naturally the most basic and important condition.
Natural beauty is not available to everyone. Therefore, most women can only add their own elegance through artificial makeup, so as to win the favor of the opposite sex, and they also get some psychological satisfaction in the process of makeup.
Ancient women attached great importance to the beauty of skin, and the skin that is ready to burst, bright, clean and tender is the basic condition of beauty, and it is also an important criterion to measure the beauty of women. We can also see a thing or two from the adjectives used by literati to describe beauty, such as "soft hands, skin like coagulated fat", "skin like ice and snow" and "ice muscle jade bone".
In addition to the beauty of skin, the ancients also paid great attention to the beauty of hair, combing it every day, caring for it, and storing more hair without cutting it. In the early days, it hung freely on the shoulders, and then tied it with ropes for practical needs, and then gradually developed a variety of bun styles, which were varied. Even in the Zhou Dynasty, wigs were used to increase the style and beauty of the head.
Scholars speculate that the most basic reason why the ancients paid attention to skin and hair should be related to ethics. "The body is skin-damaged, and the parents are afraid to damage it. Filial piety begins." However, in addition to the concept of ethics, I think aesthetic awareness and health needs are also very important reasons.
Therefore, women in ancient China had all kinds of skin care products that were suitable for different needs. The function of skin care products is basically to protect and prevent. Smart ancient people added some prescriptions to them, which increased their therapeutic efficacy. As for the way of use, it is nothing more than external use and oral administration. The ways of maintenance can also be called varied. As for how the women in the royal compound stay young forever, it is quite mysterious. Folk neighborhoods are scrambling to see if there are secret recipes circulating, and the women who are chasing the forefront of the trend are amazingly quick in imitating and infecting fashion, which has been the case since ancient times.
In terms of makeup accessories, ancient women were even more colorful than today's women, not only in form, but also by whitewashing their faces, smearing rouge on their cheeks, trimming their eyebrows, embellishing their lips, and even sticking colored flowers on their foreheads to add beautiful effects. What's more amorous is that they are calm and calm about their makeup and sitting in front of the bronze mirror, which is especially leisurely and beautiful, instead of the feeling that women are always in a hurry to make up, in the car and on the road.
Most of the cosmetics used now are chemical preparations, which have no therapeutic effect. Many cosmetics also irritate the skin and mucous membranes, causing allergies, and even some famous products contain dangerous ingredients for cancer. Nowadays, cosmetics often do more harm than good to women. In fact, as early as the Tang Dynasty, there were drugs, cosmetics and traditional Chinese medicine beauty agents in China. At that time, the prosperity was unprecedented, and women were more carefree, paying attention to appearance in different places. The aristocratic class prevailed in using drugs and cosmetics such as facial fat, hand cream and oral fat. With the gradual change of dynasties, exquisite makeup not only promoted women's status, but also men fell in love with makeup, reflecting aristocratic temperament, so we can see that the sons, ladies and even maids of Rong Ning's second house in A Dream of Red Mansions have the habit of putting on incense.
For a person, a beauty may be a little sister next door in those days, or a strange girl passing by in a blink of an eye.
For a period of history, beauty may be thin swallow and fat ring, Wang Qiang Xizi, Green Pearl in Jingu Garden, and Su Xiao by Qiantang River.
for women, beauty is more likely to be a state of mind, a calm life after several storms, and my heart is still calm as the years go by.
The beautiful women of the past are gone, and we can't imagine their charm in those days. Even the most realistic description is still unsatisfactory. It is better to use the rouge lead powder used by the beauty, the crony clothes worn, and the hairpin hairpin worn to get a good look.
There are still beautiful women in front of us. From their spiritual manifesto, we may get some insight …