Matchmaker: In the old society, men 18 years old were regarded as "weak crowns" and women 15 years old were regarded as "He Shen". When children reach the age of thirteen or fourteen, parents begin to care about their marriage. Marriage emphasizes the right family, but in fact, every time the woman looks tall, the man needs to accommodate appropriately. Therefore, there is a saying that "it is high to marry a woman, low to ask relatives, and get together". ; Generally speaking, the good women in the village lobby each other, or the man chooses the object and entrusts the matchmaker to propose marriage. If the woman agrees, the matchmaker will get her eight-character red list and send it to the man's house. The man will put the figure of eight under the stove to see if there is an ominous sign. If the kitchen doesn't lose plates and bowls and lacks spoons and chopsticks within three days, it is considered auspicious. Birthdays, whether men or women, will be sent to fortune tellers to see if there is any conflict, and all of them will be passed. Only when it is confirmed can we formally ask for help and make peace.
Letter of appointment: commonly known as "decision-making" and "engagement", after both parties confirm their marriage, the man will prepare a red sticker called "Mandarin Duck Gift Book", write the date of birth of the man on the inside page, put it in a red envelope, write a marriage proposal, prepare a new writing brush and a new ink and put it in a red leather "book batch box", and ask a male relative of our family to bring a book batch box. At the same time, according to the woman's request, send "head gifts", such as clothes, jewelry, gifts and silver. For example, during the Republic of China, the silver gift in Yixian was 108 silver. But it also depends on family wealth, but the mantissa is eight, which means "If you want to get rich, you must never leave eight". Every silver dollar should be written with the word double happiness in vermilion. After the woman receives it, her parents (father and brother) should write the woman's birthday on the left side of the inner page of the Yuanyang gift book with their newly bought pen and ink, then write "Good luck" on the cover and send it back to the man as a "book batch". The gift money received by the woman is used to buy dowry, and the rich often increase the dowry themselves. This is a formal engagement. The mandarin duck gift book is an engagement certificate. After the engagement, the man will give gifts to the woman's family three times a year.
Invitation period: after the engagement, when a man and a woman get married, the man first invites the matchmaker to ask for marriage. After being accepted, the man picked up the wedding date, wrote it on the Khmer Rouge, accompanied by corresponding gifts, and asked the matchmaker to send it to the woman's home. It was called "invitation period" in ancient times. In modern times, it was called "sending to Japan". Moving marriage: The day before or on the wedding day, the man needs to send someone to the woman's house to move the dowry, which is called "moving marriage". During the wedding, the houses of both men and women are decorated with lanterns and firecrackers. Dowry is generally room furniture and daily necessities. Wealthy families will also put some gold and silver jewelry in the sacrificial box, so that the food, clothing, housing and transportation industries are readily available and the opportunity can be enjoyed for a lifetime. (Some even prepare coffins! ! )。
Open face: also known as "Lamian Noodles". On the wedding day, menstruation or aunt should give the bride a face, that is, aim two silk threads at the hair on the bride's forehead, otherwise she will be ridiculed as "hairy face". Opening a face means that girlhood is over.
Wedding ceremony: The wedding ceremony is on duty. The bride will get married in a sedan chair. There are several boats along the river. Wedding personnel are generally matchmakers, wedding brides, uncles and young men and women of the same age as the bride and groom. There are four sedan chairs and eight rich people. The groom usually goes in person, and there are some people in Shexian who don't need to drum music and don't want the groom to come to meet the bride. When I arrived at the woman's house, her door was closed. After the man stuffed the "happiness bag" into the door, I opened the door and fired a shot to welcome the guests. Then they began to "cry and marry", and the mother and daughter cried bitterly, but the crying was more music than sadness. Why are you crying? As the saying goes, "Don't cry, don't send, cry and send." After the sedan chair goes out, some places secretly hold a bowl of water and throw it out with the sedan chair, symbolizing "marrying a woman and throwing water". The sedan chair stopped at the gate of the men's village and waited for the groom to carry it into the village. There are allusions in it. If there is a quarrel after marriage, the daughter-in-law can argue that "I didn't walk to the door by myself, but you carried me in."
Meeting the bride: It's a custom in Shexian county. When the sedan chair arrives at the man's house, the groom greets the bride in person, that is, meeting the bride. It's a custom in Yixian County. When the sedan chair arrives at the door of the man's house, both the in-laws and the groom go upstairs, waiting for the bride to enter the bridal chamber, shouting "The generation is higher, the generation is better". The bride went into the new house, took a short rest, and then came out to pay her respects.
Make trouble in the bridal chamber: After the banquet of flowers and candles, relatives and friends gather in the bride's room, and everyone makes the bride laugh in various ways, or makes fun of the bride by creating some problems. The picture is also "fried".
Huimen: On the third day of their marriage, the bride visits her parents' home, which is called Huimen. If the groom is with him, it is called "double door". The son-in-law visits all the relatives and elders of the Yue family for the first time. At noon, the Yue family will hold a banquet and call for the son-in-law. There is a saying in Huizhou that "a mother-in-law sees her son-in-law, if she sees the emperor" and "a son-in-law comes to live in her ancestral home". So it's grand. For the first time, before sunset, newlyweds must leave and go home.
Huizhou folk houses
In the old days, most urban and rural houses in Huizhou were brick and wood structures. The Ming Dynasty was characterized by spacious upstairs. After the Qing Dynasty, there were houses with three bedrooms, one bright and two bedrooms (left and right bedrooms) and four bedrooms, one bright and four dark. More than one room. The gate is decorated with landscape figures carved with stone and brick. The gatehouse has double eaves, patios are opened at each entrance, and the rainwater flows into the sewer through the dam. Commonly known as "four waters return to the hall", which means "money does not flow out" There is a partition between the entrances and a firewall (horse head wall) around it, which looks like an old castle from a distance. Generally speaking, when a family plunges in, the middle door is closed and each family lives alone. The middle door opened, and a gate came in and out to pay homage to the ancestors. The climate in Huizhou mountainous area is humid, and people generally regard the upstairs as the main habitat of daily life, retaining the legacy of "nesting" by indigenous Shanyue people. The upstairs hall is generally spacious, with a hall, bedroom and wing, and a "beauty chair" by the patio.
Living in the North: If the terrain is not special, the best orientation of the house is to sit north and face south, but most houses built in Huizhou in Ming and Qing Dynasties face north. It turns out that there are many taboos in the living habits of ancient Hui people. It was popular in the Han Dynasty that "merchants should not be in the south, and households should not be in the north". The reason is that according to the five elements, business belongs to gold and the south belongs to fire, which is unlucky; It is unlucky to levy fire. The north belongs to water, and water can kill fire. Huizhou merchants flourished in Ming and Qing Dynasties. Once they made a fortune, they went back to their hometown to build a house. For the sake of luck, the gate never faces south, and all the houses face north. Up to now, there are still tens of thousands of ancient houses facing north in Huizhou.
Houses: The houses in Huizhou are all deep, with a vestibule at the entrance, a patio in the middle and a living hall at the back. The hall is separated from the back hall by a middle door, and the back hall has two bedrooms. There is an uphill wall behind the hall with a patio and wings on both sides. This is the first entrance. The structure of the second entrance is still a ridge divided into two halls, two days before and after the well, with partition, four rooms and two halls. The third entrance, the fourth entrance or more entrances in the future have the same structure, one enters the house and the other enters the house to form the house.
Double eaves: Huizhou dwellings are double eaves buildings. There is a widely circulated story about the formation of this double-eaves custom. According to legend, during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, she was under the jurisdiction of Li Yu, the queen of the Southern Tang Dynasty. Zhao Kuangyin launched the Chen Qiao mutiny, founded the Song Dynasty, and personally marched into Zhou She. Just when Song Taizu arrived outside Haiyang City in Xiuning County today, the sky suddenly changed and rain was coming. Mao came to a tile house to shelter from the rain. In order to avoid disturbing the people, Mao ordered not to enter, but the eaves of Huizhou folk houses are very small, far less than the Central Plains. Coupled with the storm, everyone was soaked. After the rain stopped, residents opened the door and found Taizu so, thinking that he was born to die, and he couldn't afford to kneel on the ground. Mao didn't blame him and asked, Why is the eaves in Zhangzhou so narrow? The villagers replied, "This is inherited from the ancestors, and it has always been like this." Mao said, "Although the old system of our ancestors can't be changed, you can build another roof below to help pedestrians shelter from the rain." A pavilion at the entrance of the village even made sense, so someone immediately followed suit. Since then, all houses in Huizhou have been built with eaves.
Full top bed: Huizhou traditional bedding. Because the top of the bed, the back of the bed and the head of the bed are all surrounded by wooden boards, it is called "full-top bed". Hanging curtains in front of the bed is like a news station. Most of the bedposts are made of torreya grandis, which are born from the same tree for several years, and take the color of "four generations under one roof" and "five generations thriving". There are 7 beds in common use, which means "five men and two women". On the front of the bed, the carving is more exquisite. The left and right sides are generally engraved with "Feng Dan facing the sun" and the upper teeth are engraved with "Shuanglong Play Pearl". The railings around the bed are generally carved with exquisite patterns such as "Phoenix Playing Peony", "Squirrel Grape" and "Yuanyang Playing in Water".
Traditional furnishings of Huizhou folk houses. Nave's paintings and couplets are often hung on the central wall of Huizhou residential halls, or the words "Heaven and Earth are teachers" are written on red paper, all of which are mounted and hung on scrolls. There is a long table under the scroll, and there are two saddle-shaped painting feet on the desktop. When the scroll is spread down on the long table and put into the saddle of the painting foot, the picture is flat and stable. This long table is called "painting table".