Before the founding of the People's Republic of China, there was a custom of early marriage, and men and women got married at the age of fifteen or sixteen. Men and women marry at the behest of their parents and the words of a matchmaker, and there is no freedom of marriage. In October, 1913, the governor Shen Bingren announced; It is strictly forbidden for men and women to get married freely, and it is considered that "there is nothing more shameful than getting married freely". The order of marriage is from big to small, and the first brother and sister have a new suit. On the man's side, some still hang New Pants at the door of the bride's house or home. When the bride enters the door, she has to drill under her pants. To get married, you should marry the right person, and "three teas and six rituals" ("three teas" refers to the next tea; "Six rituals" refer to six rituals, such as accepting gifts, asking names, accepting gifts, inviting guests, and welcoming relatives. Otherwise, it is "sexual intercourse without media". If adultery is found, it is considered immoral, or expelled from the village, or paraded in the streets, or put into a pig cage and thrown into the river to drown. The etiquette of "Three Teas and Six Rites" is complicated. By the end of the Qing Dynasty, it was slightly simplified and generally adopted. One is "asking the name", that is, sending "Nian Geng Tie", writing the date, month and date of the suitor's birth on red paper, and giving it to the matchmaker to transfer it to the other party. Parents of both men and women give the "Nian Geng Tie" to the diviner to see if there is any similarity. Then ask relatives and friends to inquire about each other for three generations and send "three generations of stickers". Both sides write their great-parents, grandparents and parents' names and places of origin in red stickers, commonly known as "Three generations stickers", to investigate whether there are leprosy and other genetic diseases, and to investigate each other's character, ability and economic situation to see if they are suitable. The second is "invitation", that is, sending "gift stickers". The man writes the wedding date in red and informs the woman. After the woman receives the "gift paste", she will reply to the man. The third is "recruiting", that is, the male family sends someone to send a bride price to the female family. First, the man sends the "three generations of stickers" to the woman, which is also called "making a gift". After the woman received the gift, she sent her "three generations of stickers" to the man. The fourth is "pro-welcoming", according to the auspicious date agreed by both parties, wedding with a sedan chair. In the middle of the Republic of China, it was only in the society that men and women met each other, commonly known as "seeing each other". Generally, the matchmaker leads the way, and both men and women exchange tokens after they agree, in order to get engaged. Most of the tokens are gold rings and necklaces, but poor people are just a pack of "red envelopes". After the marriage is fixed, we will agree on the auspicious date, get married in a car and sedan chair, and get married formally. Before the founding of the People's Republic of China, the man had complicated etiquette such as "going to the top", "welcoming relatives", "making trouble in a new house" and "going back to the door three times" after marriage. Before getting married and getting on the sedan chair, the woman has the custom of crying and singing songs about marrying women. The content is mostly to thank her parents for their kindness and the mutual help and love between brothers and sisters. During the occupation, some accused the Japanese of invading China by crying and singing songs about marrying women. After marriage, a woman should be faithful to her life, and after her husband's death, she should be "sober", and under no circumstances can she remarry. Anyone who remarries is called "dishonor" and is discriminated against. On the contrary, powerful and rich men can have three wives and four concubines. After the death of a wife, she can continue to marry. In addition, when a woman is married, there are some vulgar customs, such as "marrying a raw chicken" and "marrying a god-dominated card". Most of the so-called "married raw chickens" are overseas Chinese who make a living abroad and can't come back to get married. Parents of both men and women arrange the wedding with a raw chicken instead of the groom to worship the world and ancestors. Wealthy families marry daughters-in-law for their dead sons, and after the bride goes through the door, they accept an adopted son to continue their heirs. This kind of "life-keeping" marriage is called "marrying God's main card". After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the above two bad habits have been abolished. Advocate freedom of marriage, and keep the wedding frugal and simple. The "sedan chair wedding" was abolished as early as 1952 during the land reform, and brides always walk or ride bicycles when they go through the door. The atmosphere of throwing wine and banquets has also been greatly reduced. In the 198s, the ostentation and extravagance of weddings rose again. Wealthy families generally used cars to get married (and some took motorcycles), and some dispatched more than 1 cars to form a motorcade, setting off firecrackers along the way, and setting up more than 1 seats for weddings. The wedding of villagers and fishermen in Shatian District, Xinhui City is a boat instead of a sedan chair, and both men and women love each other with salty water songs to express their admiration.
Enping baked wheat cake and marriage custom
There is a traditional custom in Enping urban and rural areas for men and women to marry: the man must send Enping baked wheat cake to the woman as a gift cake. This custom began in the Ming Dynasty and is still quite popular today. Enping sesame seed cake, commonly known as "Enping Shao", is a specialty of Enping, which is famous for its exquisite production and unique flavor.
Enping sesame seed cake was created in the Ming Dynasty, with a history of about 6 years. According to legend, the master who founded the sesame seed cake was a young teacher in Enping. He used to run a private school on his own ambition to enroll children from poor families.
Later, the private school was forced to close down because of the lack of funds for running the school. In order to make a living, the teacher had to make biscuits and sell them. Mr. Teaching innovated with his courage in teaching and made a unique soft cake. This kind of cake is sweet and delicious, unique in flavor, and can be kept fresh for many days, so it is very popular.
At that time, the magistrate of Zhaoqing was very economic-minded. In order to prosper the market and promote economic development, he held a cake-making contest to select the best products and promote them.
After eating the cake made by the teacher, Enping Prefecture greatly praised it. This time, I strongly recommend the teacher to participate in the competition in Zhaoqing Prefecture. On the day of the competition, the famous bakers from all walks of life tried their best to stand out. Magistrate's adult comes from a family that makes cakes. It is not easy to get his approval. When the magistrate tasted Enping sesame cake, the more he chewed it, the more delicious it became. He even ate three cakes, full of praise: "Soft and delicious, fragrant but not vulgar, sweet but not greasy, good cake?" As a result, Enping sesame seed cake won the championship in one fell swoop.
In fact, there is another purpose of recommending teachers in Enping County, which is to take the opportunity to choose a son-in-law. As expected, the teacher won the first prize in one fell swoop and became a well-known celebrity. The magistrate of a county decided to choose the teacher as a good husband. When he told his daughter his plan, her daughter refused to do anything. She thought that the cake maker had no future. Later, the teacher made a fortune by selling sesame cakes, so he reopened a private school to let poor children continue their studies, which was a story for a while. In addition to teaching, teachers also sell biscuits after school, so as to accumulate and maintain their schools. He learned that the father and daughter of the magistrate of a county like to eat his cakes. As a token of respect, he left one catty for every 1 kilograms of sesame cakes he sold, so that they could be used as gift cakes in the future. Later, the daughter of the magistrate of a county saw that the teacher was knowledgeable, hardworking and caring, and finally moved her heart. When the gift cakes accumulated to 1 Jin, the daughter of the magistrate of a county took them back, indicating that she accepted the love of the teacher.
Since then, proposing marriage and sending baked wheat cakes has gradually evolved into a kind of etiquette. Enping men and women must take baked wheat cakes as gift cakes when they marry. When a local woman becomes a monk, she is called "getting a cake" instead of getting married, which means that she has accepted each other's love. Today, Enping people ask whether the young girl is married, not: "Are you married?" Instead, he asked, "Did you get the cake?" This interesting marriage custom originated from the story of Mr. Teaching, and this custom has continued to this day.
how is enping sesame seed cake made? Its main raw materials are glutinous rice flour, including yellow sugar and white sugar, with ice meat and sesame seeds; There is also a kind of stuffing with bean paste or lotus seed paste, which must be carefully processed. After the cake blank is made, it is placed in a flat-bottomed round iron basin and fried up and down with strong fire. In this way, the sesame seed cake has the characteristics of soft and smooth entrance, and it is more sweet and moist when eaten with roasted pork, which makes people never tire of eating it.
Every wedding season comes, stalls for making Enping sesame cakes can be seen everywhere in urban and rural areas of enping city, where the fire is blazing and the fragrance is floating for miles. Enping sesame cakes with their own characteristics have become a major food and cultural landscape in Enping.
Taishan has a beautiful scenery, and its wedding characteristics have not been found. There is a custom of marriage for Hakka women in Heshan.
most of the Hakkas in Heshan migrated from Meizhou, Huizhou and Heyuan after the founding of the county (1732). Living in he cheng area (the original county), the language and marriage customs are certainly different. Before liberation, women who were brought up as adults, with the help of matchmakers, exchanged wedding invitations and horoscopes if they were suitable for each other. If they didn't agree with each other, they chose a good day to plan their marriage. When they got married, they had to perform several customs.
1. Call the night spectrum
("call" means "cry" and "sing")
Two nights before marriage, a group of female companions in a woman's boudoir acted as a foil, commonly known as "girls". Married women are deeply reluctant to tell their partners that their happy event is coming through traditional crying and singing. Some people learn traditional lyrics very early, and those who can't sing will be taught by middle-aged women until they recite and know how to sing. If they don't sing, it is disrespectful or unlucky. This custom gradually disappeared after liberation, and today women who are only about 8 years old can still sing it.
Crying is different from singing folk songs. Crying is joyful and boring, and it doesn't prolong the singing. The following is an excerpt from a lyric:
The golden rooster crows at five o'clock, and he laughs at himself (I);
There is still life after the tree is cut, and there are still two nights away from parents.
Second, the wedding reception team
The wedding reception team consists of men, four children holding colorful flags first, and then the matchmaker leading the way, two sedan chair elders, wine bearers, six six-tone drummers and several people carrying dowries. The wine bearer is shouldered by a lucky person. Among the two baskets, there is an altar of wine, pork, eggs, big black salted fish, betel nut and other foods, and there is a round red wine tray with two cypress leaves and two sealed markets. Trumpeters pass by the village to play music and inform people to show their interest. Enter the woman's house to play for a certain period of time, and then the bride cries and sings:
Sweep the wine bottle in the upper hall and the matchmaker in the lower hall;
Sweep the doorway, put the sedan chair on, and sweep the eaves with colorful flags.
Third, bid farewell to ancestors
There was a farce before bidding farewell to ancestors, which was called "drag sister" (bride). Outside the door, middle-aged women forced their way into the married woman's room and asked her to come out and get on the sedan chair, but they insisted that they were not allowed to enter, pushing and pulling each other, and even sprayed wine with their mouths to prevent problems. In order not to delay the bride's return to the man's house, the old chaperone finally dragged the bride out to bid farewell to her ancestors, and then cried and sang after paying homage to her parents.
Fourth, open an umbrella to go out
Opening an umbrella is opened by the bride's own brother, and those who have no brothers are replaced by other relatives. The umbrella opener stands on the left of the gate. After opening the umbrella, the escort pulls the bride under it. Walking to the front of the sedan chair, the bride was a little reluctant to go in, and even cried and sang, and even kicked the sedan chair door with her feet. She accompanied her mother to persuade her to get on the sedan chair with the auspicious words of marrying a man and a woman or going back to have an early baby. The two periods from saying goodbye to ancestors and getting on the sedan chair are really crying and singing. Because I have lived with my parents for more than 1 years, I feel deeply reluctant to leave suddenly. Why not make her cry and sing:
I used to take an umbrella to take advantage of the fair, but today I open an umbrella to see my sister off;
I don't want to cry when I get married, so take good care of my parents.
5. Send the sedan chair
The sedan chair is sent by the men, women and children in the village. The mileage of the delivery is generally about one Li, but the sedan chair has to be stopped three times in the middle to show that it is reluctant to leave the relatives. The bride also sprinkled some profit-making red envelopes in the sedan chair, and whoever picked them up returned to him. After getting out of the car for the third time, I went back to the man's house and stopped crying and singing. The last two sentences:
Brother sent the sedan chair to the river and asked for money when he went back to live in the house;
I'll send my sedan chair to the middle of the road, go back to start a business and get married early.
VI. When you arrive at your husband's house
When you arrive at the door of your husband's house, the man's old escort will say something auspicious in front of the sedan chair, such as "white hair Qi Mei, three years to hold two". Put a washbasin in front of the door beforehand, fill it with a small amount of water, put a kitchen knife, a ruler, a small thatch and peach leaves, which means to drive away spirits and ghosts, and at the same time light a fire with a small bundle of hay, which means to go back to my husband's house cleanly. The bride, led by her escort, covered her head with a rice screen, first crossed the basin and then crossed the small fire to enter the new house. After dinner, the groom invited the young men and women in the village to see the bride, commonly known as "disturbing the bride", and they both entered the bridal chamber after seeing them off late at night. The next morning, the bride was led by her escort, and after offering tea to her ancestors, grandfathers and grandmothers, she presented the bride with jewelry and money.
exploring the seven dynasties
after returning to her husband's house for the seven dynasties, the woman organized more than ten middle-aged women to visit the man's house for the so-called "exploring the seven dynasties". As on the wedding day, the groom wore a felt hat and gown to propose a toast to his mother-in-law. After three dynasties, the man was accompanied by a middle-aged woman to his bride's home, carrying a simple handwritten letter and two green-peel sugarcane with heads and leaves, which meant that the two in-laws were as sweet as sugar and won the victory day by day.
After her mother's family lived for three dynasties, the woman's mother sent the bride back to her husband's house, knocking on the door of the new in-laws for the first time, and then she was not bound by all kinds of rules and regulations.
Kaiping folk songs and marriage customs
Seventy or eighty years ago, Kaiping folk songs were quite popular. At that time, ordinary women and children liked to reflect their lives and express their feelings by singing. Every wedding celebration is often celebrated by singing, including songs from the top, blessing song, and disorderly house songs. If you comb your hair, there will be "a comb to the eyebrows, white hair Qi Mei; Two combs to the tail, with a head and a tail; Three combs fall to the ground, children and grandchildren are everywhere. Although the words are different from place to place, they are similar. Another example is a married woman who is dissatisfied with her marriage, and sends out a song of sorrow and injustice. Even the funeral is white, but also in the form of crying songs to express grief.
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