Since ancient times, how many women's joys and sorrows have been concentrated in a small cosmetic box! One of the most touching stories is the legendary "Du Shiniang's Wrath Box" in the Ming Dynasty. Du Shiniang, a famous prostitute in the south of the Yangtze River, quietly stored her jewelry before her death and found her husband to redeem her marriage. On the way home, I was afraid that her unscrupulous husband would sell her to a wealthy businessman as a concubine and push her into the fire resistance. Being insulted and hurt for many years, she accumulated a strong desire for freedom and waited hard. Once, she was completely shattered by Broken Hearts. She took out her cosmetic case and stood at the bow, throwing priceless jewels into the river one by one, then jumped down and was swallowed up by the turbulent turbidity current. The story begins with the cosmetic box and ends with the cosmetic box.
What the hell is in this cosmetic box? From more than 2,000 collections, The Inheritance of Cosmetic Boxes selects the traditional silver ornaments of women from the Ming and Qing Dynasties to the Republic of China and makes them into exquisite plates for readers to fully ponder and appreciate.
This is a fascinating collection, because it has become history, belongs to the past, and is difficult to reproduce in reality; But it has too many historical sites to recall, and it will revive the disappeared historical traces in front of us.
The largest collection is hairpin and hairpin, which are ornaments used by the ancients to tie their hair. Han women like braided hairstyles. Long hair hangs over the head and is fixed with one or several hairpins. The winding way of the bun and the diversity of the hairpins bring colorful decorative effects, which are pleasing to the eye. This long and short hairpin is made of gold, silver, jade, bone and wood, inlaid with various precious stones and finely carved. From royalty to peasant women, they all have their own hairpins, but the expensive ones show the wealth and status of the holders.
Hairpins are not only decorations, but also linked with the fate of the ancients. This hairpin is also called "Fu", female 15 years old. If she gets married, she will tie a knot called "above". Those who have done "Fu" are all people who want to marry, so she is called "Fu". Men's annual "crown ceremony" is an adult ceremony, that is, tying a knot and wearing a crown on their heads. Two small holes are reserved on the left and right sides of the crown and fixed through the bun with a hair pin. Men have to go through the "coronation ceremony" and women have to go through the "gift ceremony" to get married and start an important turning point in life. Underage women don't need to insert hairpins. They usually tie their hair on both sides of their heads and comb it into branches or horns. The reason why the ancients called childhood "total angle" and the reason why girls called it "girl" came from the hairstyle and hair accessories of childhood. Nowadays, people often use "to grow old with their husbands" to express loving couples and grow old together. The allusion comes from the Book of Songs: "A gentleman grows old together with his son." This "deputy" is a headdress, and "yoga" is a golden pendant made by fingers, so the last sentence of a gentleman in his later years is "deputy six yoga", which is used to describe a lady's makeup headdress. Women are born hair lovers, regardless of rank, and often call themselves "skirts". The twelve heroines in a Dream of Red Mansions are called "Twelve Golden Hairpins" by the world. It can be seen that the appellations and wishes of ancient men and women at all stages, from childhood, adulthood, marriage to old age, are actually related to Xiaopin. Hairstyles and jewelry that everyone can hold are so closely related to the livelihood of China people that it is rare in the world.
This hairpin can also increase the graceful gait of women. There is a pendant bead chain, which is connected by a filiform gold, silver or bone rod and inserted into a bun in a trembling way. It is called "Walking", which vividly shows the image of a gentle lady.
"Banchai" has her own female husband, the first female general in China, who was the wife of Shang Dynasty four thousand years ago. There is a statue in uniform in the museum of Yin Ruins in Anyang. Na Wei Town is a square and an elf on earth, which shows her strength in commanding hordes. Unexpectedly, in her tomb, there are more than 20 exquisite jade articles and as many as 490 inscriptions. What a nice cosmetic box! Unexpectedly, under her helmet, there are wonderful bun and hairpin. This is reminiscent of the story that Mulan, who joined the army, painted yellow on the mirror. It turns out that women in China don't "love red makeup and arms", and there are more hairpin women in female funerary objects than combat knives, which just shows that female heroes love "arms" and "red clothes" more.
A bun is the beauty of hair. Because hair is located in the most prominent position at the end of the human head, it can best show the literary talent of the human body, so a high bun is often the embodiment of noble status, both at home and abroad. Perhaps/kloc-European women in the 0/8th century won our hearts with their high bun, thin waist and flared skirts. Don't you know that dating back to 300 years ago, the bun of European women in the15th century turned out to be a clever "bonsai", with hunting, mills, fortresses, warships and even a group of cattle and sheep. To do this hairstyle, you need two kilograms of hair wax, three kilograms of powder, more than ten meters of gauze and hundreds of hair plugs. This is not a personal show, but a popular fashion in society. If the countess, boudoir and Xiaojiabiyu compare with each other, the bun will be more plastic and higher. This is incredible! Can you sleep well with such a heavy burden on your head? I thought it was the only one, but I didn't expect the ancient people in China to show weakness in their high bun. In the mural of the patron saint of Cave 6 1 in Dunhuang Mogao Grottoes, there is a woman of the Five Dynasties. The bun on her head is made into a huge phoenix, and the height of the bun is more than twice that of her face. However, people in China don't need waxing, but use shaving water, made of paper-thin special wooden strips soaked in water, and then fixed with various hairpins, so that the giant phoenix can be safely located on the top of the head. Wood shavings are water green, and the hair sticks can be inserted and removed, which is much easier to clean and remove makeup than wax, powder and yarn piled on the head. It's so easy to put on makeup, which is a clever creation of China women.
In the Ming and Qing Dynasties, many women's hairstyles appeared in China, which were really beautiful, such as peony head, shower head, alms bowl head, broken horse bun, Suzhou unique, flat three sets, chain bun, double bun, round bun, Babatou bun and Shuangfei bun. Each hairstyle has different shapes of hair clips, which are molded, hammered, cut and hollowed out. Manchu women also have a flat rectangular hair accessory called "flat square" with auspicious words engraved on it. Hair is wrapped around a flat square and placed at the top of the hair. These are two heads, and then covered with corollas, they become big wings.
In fact, the jewelry in the cosmetic box is not limited to hairpins for dressing, but also garlands, pins, collars, necklaces, bracelets, lockers, earrings, rings, Yu Pei and so on. All parts of the body are decorated accordingly. Why only talk about "jewelry" and not other accessories, that is, take the first jewelry as an agent, which is related to the attitude change of China jewelry. The aesthetic concept of ancient people in China was mainly head and face, other parts were covered with wide clothes, and the chest was flattened with a corset. All the things that can be appreciated are concentrated in the upper body of the human body, among which the hair clips that can be dressed and styled at will are especially favored by women. With the development of society and the change of aesthetic concept, the emphasis of decoration is also changing. Modern women rarely tie their hair in a bun, so their hair sticks are naturally useless; When the neck is exposed, the decorative effect of the necklace is outstanding; Bare legs and fashionable anklets; Belly clothes are very popular, and navel decorations are also very popular. However, no matter how ever-changing, jewelry originated from ancient aesthetic consciousness is still elegant. Otherwise, how can necklaces and anklets be called "jewelry"?
Due to the limited collection, there is no gold hairpin in the "cosmetic box heritage", only silver hairpin. Gold hairpin is more expensive and exquisite than silver hairpin, so silver hairpin is slightly inferior to gold hairpin. Only in this way can the silver hairpin belong to the civilian class and vividly show the dress of civilian women.
With the development of the times, modern women may enjoy richer and more fancy cosmetic products than in ancient times, but don't forget that hand-made products are always unique, because they are not modular mechanical production, but personalized creation for different people. Each silver hairpin shows a different personality due to the different styles and techniques of the producers, and there are few similarities. The superiority of this hand-made work has been fully demonstrated here.
The cosmetic box is a treasure chest, which opens up the beautiful scenery decorated by the ancients for modern people and is worth appreciating. It's a pity that this book is short in words, just a simple explanation, and its research skills are still insufficient. To our credit, the author started with data collection and collation.