Many historical books of Han, Wei, Jin, Sui and Tang dynasties recorded cotton, and it was not until the Southern Song Dynasty that textiles really began to appear. In other words, people began to wear cotton textiles in the Song and Yuan Dynasties before the Ming Dynasty, but it was not popularized at that time, and it did not begin to develop until the Ming Dynasty.
Long before these dynasties, how did people keep out the cold in winter? First of all, since the primitive society, people have been warming themselves in wild fire. But because the fire lasted for a limited time, primitive people couldn't stay near the fire all the time. They began to look for rattan leaves of some plants to make clothes. Later, after they learned to make stone tools and tools, they hunted, skinned animals and made clothes to keep out the cold.
In the Xia and Shang Dynasties, the most popular warm clothes-linen and silk-appeared. At that time, silk and linen were the main fabrics, and the rich wore silk. When it is cold, they can put silk cotton under their silk clothes to keep out the cold. I remember when Shujun was in junior high school, the history teacher talked about the silk clothing technology of Shang Dynasty. You can still see the moles on your body when you wear 7 pieces. It's too thin to have silk hair. I really don't wear it.
People have no condition to wear silk clothes. Their clothes are generally coarse, hot in summer and cold in winter. We refer to the poor as "cloth", that is, this coarse cloth. Later, robe-style clothes appeared, Hanfu in Han Dynasty and Tangzhuang in Tang Dynasty.
At this time, the clothing products were much wider than those in Shang and Zhou Dynasties, including silk, satin, cotton, wadding, velvet and so on. Silk products can not only be made into silk fabrics, but also be used as fillers for cotton, wadding tires, velvet and so on, directly filling clothes and bedding to keep out the cold. People still pay attention to animal skin products to keep out the cold. Rich people will wear fox fur, mink, tiger fur coats and so on. In ancient times, leather clothes were collectively called "Qiu". I'm sure you've heard the story of Meng Changjun offering white fox skin.
Although the poor do not have such conditions, they can still wear some inferior fur coats to keep out the cold, such as sheepskin clothes and dog fur coats. Why did cotton generally take the place of lint and hemp? Mainly because cotton is a kind of plant, it is easy to plant in a large area, and it is more convenient to obtain materials than animal skins, and it does not need to be re-made. Its warmth retention is higher than hemp and as good as fur. However, because cotton-padded clothes have a heavier disadvantage, down jackets that are warmer and lighter are becoming popular now.