In Hangzhou in the Ming Dynasty, "people don't have stone shops, but they don't mean to save, that is, husbands and servants go to work all day, go to the market to eat wine at night, and the couple get drunk and do something else tomorrow."
The citizens of Shuntianfu are also "no burden at home, and food and clothing are planned in a huge room".
After the mid-Jiajing period of Ming Dynasty in Boping County, Shandong Province, "feast with an empty mind, delicious food is a big gift".
The people of Yuncheng County "the poor also beat cattle and fresh, gathered together to worship, and fought luxuriously with the rich, even to the point of losing packets." ..... Small officials are also extravagant people, and daily meals are intended for officials. ..... There is no distinction between young and old in the village, and honest and thrifty people are embarrassed to laugh. "
In Tongzhou, South Zhili, during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, the dishes of "the villagers feast for January for no reason" were very rich, "a little cheaper, for fear of blasphemy".
Qingzhen, Tongxiang County, Zhejiang Province, "its customs are still extravagant, and the Japanese society's weddings and funerals are shameful and frugal. People who are burdened by the poor have beautiful wives and must drink at night. "
In the Ming dynasty, there was a "savings box". The box is divided into squares with different shapes, and all kinds of food are collected in a box, which can be taken out for sightseeing. "Set seats with saving box, began in Qin Long, abuse in wanli. It was originally used by officials. This year, domestic servants and turtles used boxes to drink and travel. There are box hotels inside and outside the county, but I promise the government will be convenient. "
During the Ming Dynasty, He visited a friend in Jiaxing. "More than 20 Japanese guests saw silver water stoves and gold drops in their homes. Each guest has a pair of golden platforms and plates, which are double gold cups for killing tigers. Each pair is about fifteen or sixty-two. "
In the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, it was even worse. The Home of Ordinary People was first published in the official edition, that is, the rhinoceros jade wine vessel was presided over by Hua Bin, ... and the jade cup was often used as chopsticks, so the extravagant owners in ancient times dared not use it lightly, and the people who are cold today refused to cherish it deeply. "(If the thrifty Emperor Chongzhen knew that many of his subjects were richer than him, I don't know what he would think.)
In terms of clothing, the wealth of Ming people is equally amazing.
During Hongzhi and Zhengde years in the Ming Dynasty, the Ministry of Rites told Zhou Xi that "luxury and luxury blend, and the cost of borrowing is used to it, while jewelry is abused. Generally, bachelors use embroidered socks, and craftsmen make them at will, so there is no fear."
Li Mengyang (1473- 1530), a famous writer, described the wealth of merchants in the Ming Dynasty as "the merchant's home today, fat and rich, with strong clothes and embroidery, ... its wealth is no different from that of princes." "
Yangzhou businessmen are rich in capital, and "they are all rich in palaces, luxuriously dressed, extravagant in diet, decorating horses and lavishing money".
Small towns like Boping County in the east of Lianshan Mountain are also "the most moral". During the Jiajing period, the ancient style gradually faded, and ... street vendors and servants also wore more hats and thin gauze skirts. "
During the Wanli period in Nantong, "Zhong Tong said that Luo Qi was short of treasures, and he looked for Wu silks and so on. Those camel browns are expensive, and the beautiful ones think that clothes are clothes, so they all take socks. To the so-called kudzu vine, the natural color cloth was not listed for a long time, so no one took it. As for cheap goods, they also wear square headscarves, so it is forbidden. Its excellent slaves, poor people who live in poverty and sell goods, and people on the road are all connected, but people don't feel any different. "
The phenomenon of "no silk, no clothes, no gold thread, no towel, no clouds and no shoes" has appeared in many parts of the country. South Zhili Songjiang, "slaves strive for glory", "women's clothes are prostitutes" and "slaves wear three official shoes, just like officials". In Neiqiu, Henan Province, "the door is fast and soap is nothing more than a cloud shoe, and the medical care is not a square towel." In Fuan, Fujian, "Fang Jinying Road, a famous scholar-bureaucrat was stolen by the village rich, and butchers and slaves became white-collar workers". Hangzhou people "eat in the same month and in different years, regardless of whether they are rich or poor. When they look at each other, they are poor. They are luxuriously decorated, arrogant and extravagant, and they are rich and heartless." Even humble scholars who pretend to be lofty should follow the fashion. "Cloth robe is Confucianism, your age is shabby. The poor must wear thick and flowery clothes, which is called lightness and splendor ... Shanghai students must wear velvet robes in winter and hold green umbrellas in summer, although they are as poor as Dan. " (Fan Lian's "Copying from the Cloud" in the Ming Dynasty) "If you go to the villagers' meeting without clothes and literary talent, the villagers will snicker and not sit in the seat" (Wanli's "Tongzhou Zhi")
The above contents are taken from Teng Xincai's Commodity Economy in the Middle and Late Ming Dynasty, Food Culture in the Middle and Late Ming Dynasty and Clothing Culture in the Middle and Late Ming Dynasty.
The scale of inns in the Ming Dynasty was as big as that of five-star hotels now.
Zhang Dai, a famous writer in Ming Dynasty, described the inn in Tai 'an as follows:
"Shoppers, first come to a class, registered, people's shop case silver San Qian eight liang, people pay taxes YanShan a penny eight liang. This shop is third-rate. ..... how. There are more than 20 performers in the store, and there are countless performers and singers. There are more than 20 kitchens, chefs and 200 people running services. ..... The guests arrive every day, but the old and new rooms don't attack each other, the meat and vegetables are not mixed, and the welcome service doesn't cooperate with each other, which is unpredictable. "
"People who go to Taian in the inn will never look at the inn again. "
The reason why Tai 'anfu Inn is so developed is precisely because of the unprecedented development of tourism in Ming Dynasty. Mount Tai is a tourist attraction, which is why there is such a large-scale inn.
Later generations only knew that there was Xu Xiake in the Ming Dynasty, but they didn't know that Xu Xiake was only one of the most prominent tourism booms in the middle and late Ming Dynasty. In fact, by the middle and late Ming Dynasty, tourism had become an activity that almost all dignitaries, literati and ordinary people were keen on. Many people even gave up the imperial examination for travel.
The degree of tourism prosperity in the middle and late Ming Dynasty cannot be introduced in detail here. You can look at the Theory of Tourism Culture in the Middle and Late Ming Dynasty written by Teng Xincai to see how prosperous the tourism industry was in the Ming Dynasty.
To sum up, other dynasties became poorer and poorer, and only China in the Ming Dynasty became richer and richer.
In terms of wealth, the living standard of the people in the richest Kanggan period of the Qing Dynasty, the so-called prosperous period of Kanggan, was far lower than that in the late Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, which was already in a weak period. According to the standard of Kanggan's so-called prosperous times, at least 250 years of the nearly 300-year history of the Ming Dynasty were super prosperous times!
In Lian's "Copy from the Cloud", there is a line like this: "There are fine wood guys, such as desks and Zen chairs. I have never seen them before. People only use ginkgo gold lacquer square table. Since Mo, two sons, Gu and Song, have used several pieces of good wood, all of which were bought from Wumen. Dragon, for thousands of years, although the slave's fast armor home, all use exquisite utensils, and the small carpenter with emblem, who strives to be the boss in the county government, that is, dowry miscellaneous utensils, belong to this category. Wanku is luxurious, but wood is not expensive enough. The tables in the bed cabinet are made of rosewood, beech, ebony, acacia and boxwood, which are extremely expensive and tacky. Very strange. If the soap is fast enough to stop occasionally, that is, take a rest and spread it with wooden boards. There are jars, fish and flowers in the yard, and the table is dusted inside. This is called a study, but I don't know what book the soap is reading. "
You can see how rich the people in the Ming Dynasty were. Even a small soap can have such a standard of living: "It is particularly strange. For example, soap can only stop occasionally, that is, the whole rest is paved with wooden boards. The urn is full of fish and flowers, and there is a dusty fine table inside. This is called a study, but I don't know what books soap can read."
Objectively speaking, if we don't consider the convenience of household appliances brought by scientific and technological progress, the living standard of ordinary people in the Ming Dynasty is higher than that in China today only in terms of food, clothing, housing and transportation.
If you think that the records of the Ming people themselves are unreliable, you can also look at the records of foreign missionaries who came to China at that time, which are basically similar or even better. (
At the end of the Ming Dynasty, western missionaries were still praising China's rich products and its material production capacity far exceeding that of Europe, claiming that "Daming people" were "well dressed, elegant, civilized and educated" and "China people readily praised their neighbors for any virtue, but their courage was not as good as their own, while people in other countries did not like anything except their own. When Chinese people saw the products from Europe, they gave a sigh of admiration, although these products were not exquisite. This humility is really admirable, especially in a nation that can surpass others. For those who blindly and deliberately belittle what they see, this is a shame. "
However, Madzar, the British envoy, said in the diary of his mission during the Qianlong period: "Since the Manchu Tatar conquest (China), at least in the past 150 years, there has been no improvement, no progress, or more precisely, retrogression; When we advance in the field of art and science every day, they are actually becoming semi-barbarians. " "There is amazing poverty everywhere", "People are in rags, even naked", "The army is as shabby as beggars", "All the rubbish we throw away is caught and eaten" and "We are walking in the streets of Beijing, and a man actually squats in front of us to relieve his stool". [and Wu's "The Germination of Capitalism in China" (People's Publishing House, 1985), chapter 4, section 1], this is the so-called "anti-Jiangxi prosperity" recorded in western history books. In a sense, the Manchu conquest of the Ming Dynasty once again announced the interruption of China culture.