Chinese tradition, ceremony,culture

Tse

Junior Member
Registered Member
3. If the red robe of the woman is from Qing dynasty, it is a aristocratic woman (诰命夫人) who is allowed to wear dragon motif. The cloth is not really Ming style. It is not 交领, but buttoned in the middle which is rather Manchu. Remember she is aristocrat, her cloth is uniform so it has to be closer to Qing court dress. The reason that she may look in Ming style is her hair style which is not Manchu. But that is just because she is a Han, she will not and can not have her hair in the Manchu style (the banner style, 板头).
Yes I am aware that it did not apply to women and children, my point being that despite that, the Ming women's style did not survive into the modern era but still adopted qipao's 斜襟. Evidently our ancestors did not regard it as a serious problem since they adopted it voluntarily, considering that that standing collar was already "Hanfu". I'm only discussing women's, because let's be honest, men's clothing has been constantly bombarded by foreign influence since the Northern and Southern dynasties; Song Dynasty 沈括 said: 中國衣冠,自北齊以來,乃全用胡服. The belief that Qing clothing represents a dramatic imposition of foreign culture is bizarre when the styles have merely cross influenced gradually (portraits of Manchus from the first few generations show that they had no standing collar, but the Han women did, the modern Qipao is a mixture of both and western dresses)
The first woman I posted is the mother of the Taichang emperor, her 对襟 buttons caught my attention,
jv6tz9.jpg

another Ming dynasty "fashion-forward"?
and the last one is also definitely Ming, and I have some photos of non-imperial family ones as well (Ming), which is why I found it so strange.
d2c8bdf41b621fcad344721b79e6284e_hd.jpg

v2-61d9fcdb4bf503b3e23c46ddfcec1457_hd.jpg

Well the whole point I was trying to drive at was that Qing clothing should not be singled out for exclusion as some kind of "foreign" entity; if that were true all the round collar robes (probably uygur in origin), trousers, 曳撒, possibly 褙子 and many others would be out as well. Once I had some Korean trying to tell me that the Official's robes used in Korea, Japan and Vietnam was not from Chinese influence, "because they all came from Central Asia".
 

taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
Yes I am aware that it did not apply to women and children, my point being that despite that, the Ming women's style did not survive into the modern era but still adopted qipao's 斜襟. Evidently our ancestors did not regard it as a serious problem since they adopted it voluntarily, considering that that standing collar was already "Hanfu". I'm only discussing women's, because let's be honest, men's clothing has been constantly bombarded by foreign influence since the Northern and Southern dynasties; Song Dynasty 沈括 said: 中國衣冠,自北齊以來,乃全用胡服. The belief that Qing clothing represents a dramatic imposition of foreign culture is bizarre when the styles have merely cross influenced gradually (portraits of Manchus from the first few generations show that they had no standing collar, but the Han women did, the modern Qipao is a mixture of both and western dresses)
The first woman I posted is the mother of the Taichang emperor, her 对襟 buttons caught my attention,
jv6tz9.jpg

another Ming dynasty "fashion-forward"?
and the last one is also definitely Ming, and I have some photos of non-imperial family ones as well (Ming), which is why I found it so strange.
d2c8bdf41b621fcad344721b79e6284e_hd.jpg

v2-61d9fcdb4bf503b3e23c46ddfcec1457_hd.jpg

Well the whole point I was trying to drive at was that Qing clothing should not be singled out for exclusion as some kind of "foreign" entity; if that were true all the round collar robes (probably uygur in origin), trousers, 曳撒, possibly 褙子 and many others would be out as well. Once I had some Korean trying to tell me that the Official's robes used in Korea, Japan and Vietnam was not from Chinese influence, "because they all came from Central Asia".
I agree with you. And to be clear, my post was not meant to refute or reject, but rather as a comment on a small detail.
 

Tse

Junior Member
Registered Member
On a different note, Manchus are from NW China, not from Siberia. They're not a small tribe either, they're the descendants of the Jurchens, who ruled Northern China as the Jin dynasty.

While it's true that Wu Sangui's betrayal facilitated the Manchu invasion of Ming (or rather what's left of it after Li Zicheng), the Manchu held the reins of power from start to finish. Li Hongzhang was just a functionary, it was Cixi who dominated the Qing government. As for Yuan Shikai, he didn't so much "dominate" the Qing government as helped overthrow it.
I don't mean to disagree with you there, all I'm saying is that the difference between Qing and Ming clothing is not that abrupt and should be perceived as a continuum. And I was just being facetious with the "tiny Siberian" thing :p, but relative to China they are still rather insignificant, people tend to forget that there was large scale intermingling and even intermarriage (very unusual for a "foreign people") between Han and Jurchens during the Ming Dynasty, and people like Shang Kexi and Geng Zhongming outright crossed the border to offer their services to this people (also very unusual for "barbarians").
By "dominate" I meant dominate in terms of numbers of appointments, not that they were literally more powerful than the Emperor!
 

Icmer

Junior Member
Registered Member
I agree with others, but not so sure of Hakka. The reason that I said about their isolation was because there were many researches on the group conducted in China due to their "being special", not really due to my own observation.

Regarding personal features, I don't trust much of an individual, there is a saying "南人北相,北人南相", "southerner looks northerner and vis versa". I only know one Hakka from Guangdong, my life long buddy, he is pretty much undistinguishable in appearance from people in Beijing, his parents are from the same place.

What I want to say is that a few individual's representation is far from enough to make any conclusion.

Right, I of course agree that a definitive judgment of ancestry can't be made from appearance alone. There is broad agreement, however, that Hakka have multiple origins that aren't limited to migrants from the Central Plains which include southern admixture.

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It is commonly held that the Hakkas are a subgroup of the
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that originated in
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.
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To trace their origins, three accepted theories so far have been brought forth among anthropologists, linguists, and historians:
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  1. The Hakkas are Han Chinese originating solely from the
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    in China (present
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    and
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    provinces);
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  2. The Hakkas are Han Chinese from the Central Plain, with some inflow of those already in the south;
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  3. The majority of the Hakkas are Han Chinese from the south, with portions coming from those in the north.
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The latter two theories are the most likely and are together supported by multiple scientific studies.
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Clyde Kiang stated that the Hakkas' origins may also be linked with the Han's ancient neighbors, the
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and
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people.
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However, this is disputed by many scholars and Kiang's theories are considered to be controversial.
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Hakka–Chinese scientist and researcher Dr. Siu-Leung Lee stated in the book by Chung Yoon-Ngan, The Hakka Chinese: Their Origin, Folk Songs And Nursery Rhymes, that the potential Hakka origins from the northern Han and
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, and that of the indigenous southern
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(畬族) and
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(越族) tribes, "are all correct, yet none alone explain the origin of the Hakka", pointing out that the problem with "
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" on limited numbers of people within population pools cannot correctly ascertain who are really the southern Chinese, because many southern Chinese are also from northern Asia; Hakka or non-Hakka.
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It is known that the earliest major waves of Hakka migration began due to the attacks of the two afore-mentioned tribes during the
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.
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As an aside which broadly relates to the subject of Chinese historical linguistics, I have found that speakers of various southern dialects can recognize similarities in their dialect to this reading of a Li Bai poem in reconstructed Middle Chinese:


In the comments I see people noting similarities to Hokkien, Hakka, Wu, Cantonese, etc.
I showed it to my family and they were surprised by how familiar it sounds compared to our native dialect from Kaiping, Guangdong.

Another notable thing I have found is that, according some commenters, this reading of another Li Bai poem in Taishanese (I have a special interest in this since, like Kaiping, Taishan is considered part of the Siyi region, whose languages are closely related and belong to the Yue family like Guangzhou Cantonese) sounds very similar to some Hokkien dialects. I have also read elsewhere that the Siyi dialects resemble Hakka more than the standard Cantonese spoken in Guangzhou since the linguistic shifts are more conservative. From comparing character pronunciations on Wiktionary, which hinclude IPA readings in Hakka and Cantonese, I can attest to this greater resemblance.


My takeaway from all this is that all the southern Chinese dialects, Hakka or otherwise, derive great influence from the Middle Chinese spoken during the Tang and Song dynasties, and that this is reflective of the sweeping centralization of imperial governance and thus linguistic influence across medieval China in addition to north-south migrations caused by war and unrest.
 

SilentObserver

Junior Member
Registered Member
The current "Hanfu" is a reinterpretation and mix of clothing of Han/Huaxia people from various dynasties and historical periods. Clothing of Han/Huaxia has changed drastically in the past 3000 years. If we put clothes of Ming female dress on the side of Tang female dress, you would not even call them the same.

The current "Hanfu" trend is more based on Qin and Han dynasty. While the cloth in your video is more of a creation of modern TV shows. It is IMO a mix of upper side of Qin/Han with a lower side of Tang (and afterwards).

Basically, there is no one type of Chinese traditional clothing that can be defined by today's "Hanfu" concept.
Thanks for the info! This is still a learning process for me.
 

taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
My takeaway from all this is that all the southern Chinese dialects, Hakka or otherwise, derive great influence from the Middle Chinese spoken during the Tang and Song dynasties, and that this is reflective of the sweeping centralization of imperial governance and thus linguistic influence across medieval China in addition to north-south migrations caused by war and unrest.

Some extra thought.

I think the source is even older than middle Chinese from Tang and Song, but include Qin and Han that is old Chinese.

The first major migration of Han/Huaxia people from north to south started at Qin and Han's expansion. Qin reached Sichuan, Guangdong and Guangxi, not fully controlling but set up barracks, the soldiers and officials stayed. Han dynasty fully controlled Zhejiang and Fujian only decades after its establishment (around time of emperor Wu), massive migration and settlement of northerners came afterwards. These soldier settlers brought in the old Chinese, mixed with locals, and probably took in local pronunciations (think about Indian English).

Some hundred years later during Tang (conquest) and Song (refuge), the old Chinese in the central plain has evolved into middle Chinese, diverted from the now southern Chinese (Fujian, Zhejiang and Guangdong). The one theory of Hakka is that they are the descendent of the second wave of settlers from the central plain who brought in the middle Chinese, then mixed with the earlier Han settlers, and also other non-Han people.

Again, during the transition period of Yuan and Ming, there is another wave of north-south migration due to the war. That is one reason that my family name is more prominent in Southern China than the north (I am from Shanxi) where the name originated.

I personally believe in the 1 and 2 theories. At least that is what I get from the sources from mainland. The reason against the 3rd is that, even the Han Chinese from south was descendent of even earlier people from north, that makes it no difference with theory 2, only matter of time. The fundamental fact is that Han/Huaxia population originated from the north, there was never Han/Huaxia people south of Yanzte/Huai rivers before the western Zhou dynasty began its expansions via its feudal subjects (Chu, Wu, Yue, Chen etc.).

You can read more from 东周列国志 (Stories of Kingdoms of Eastern Zhou) which has quite some detailed descriptions of Chu, Wu, Yue's expansion in south. I have also read "先秦两汉故事" (Stories of Pre-Qin and West and East Han) about Qin's in Sichuan and Han in Fujian, it is an old book compiled based on Shiji and Hanshu.
  1. The Hakkas are Han Chinese originating solely from the
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    in China (present
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    and
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    provinces);
    Please, Log in or Register to view URLs content!
  2. The Hakkas are Han Chinese from the Central Plain, with some inflow of those already in the south;
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  3. The majority of the Hakkas are Han Chinese from the south, with portions coming from those in the north.
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Regarding "sweeping centralization of imperial governance"
That is for sure, population of capital will emulate the officials dialect, especially the Emperors. That is evident everywhere in the world, like "Queen's English", "Parisian French" etc. That is prestige, but also practical as to find a job in the government. From there it will spread all over the country. Shanxi dialect would have been the "standard Mandarin" if Tang dynasty lasted till today instead of Beijing dialect. Regardless which dialect, one thing is certain "centralization and unification of political power will lead to unification of language and culture".
 
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taxiya

Brigadier
Registered Member
After looking at the above painting, I wondering why Asian paintings never reflected ideas of linear perspective?
What do you mean by "linear perspective"?

The one thing differentiate western and Chinese paintings is the lack of attention to accurate optical perspective. Is that what you meant? Not only painting, but sculptures lack the accuracy of proportion, comparing Greco/Roman sculptures and Chinese figures. The most accurate proportional Chinese sculptures are the Terracotta warriors, even that is only on the early Greek sculptures during the proto-Greco era (Mycenaean and Minoan period before the Greeks were called Greeks).

As of the reason, I heard one theory which I think is reasonable is that Chinese does not enjoy the idea of bodily portrait or sculpture in art. Portrait of a living person is mostly used as representation after their death with few exceptions. Sculptures are either deities in temple, or burial accessorial. Something to do with the view of living and deities (dead ancestors are deities).
 
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solarz

Brigadier
After looking at the above painting, I wondering why Asian paintings never reflected ideas of linear perspective?

I know very little about paintings, all I can go on is what I feel when I look at them.

Take, for example, the following two paintings:

5823160-8c7037b3fb20b143


vs

hero-charles-partridge-adams.jpg



You can see that they capture two difference essences. The french impressionism gives a feeling of wild and ruggedness, with a cold, crisp, mountain breeze blowing through the pine trees. The chinese painting feels far more ethereal, as if the scene exists not in our mortal world, but in some celestial realm.

I would go further and say that the french impressionism captures a moment in time. Looking at that painting, I can almost imagine myself as the painter, having just climbed over a mountain and finding myself face to face with this majestic scenery.

On the other hand, the chinese painting feels like I'm standing outside of time, gazing at those mountains as an eternity passes by.
 

Icmer

Junior Member
Registered Member
Some extra thought.

I think the source is even older than middle Chinese from Tang and Song, but include Qin and Han that is old Chinese.

The first major migration of Han/Huaxia people from north to south started at Qin and Han's expansion. Qin reached Sichuan, Guangdong and Guangxi, not fully controlling but set up barracks, the soldiers and officials stayed. Han dynasty fully controlled Zhejiang and Fujian only decades after its establishment (around time of emperor Wu), massive migration and settlement of northerners came afterwards. These soldier settlers brought in the old Chinese, mixed with locals, and probably took in local pronunciations (think about Indian English).

Some hundred years later during Tang (conquest) and Song (refuge), the old Chinese in the central plain has evolved into middle Chinese, diverted from the now southern Chinese (Fujian, Zhejiang and Guangdong). The one theory of Hakka is that they are the descendent of the second wave of settlers from the central plain who brought in the middle Chinese, then mixed with the earlier Han settlers, and also other non-Han people.

According to the most accepted linguistic classifications seen in the chart below, the Wu and Min dialect families are derived from Old Chinese while Yue and Mandarin from Middle Chinese.

SinoTibetanTree.svg


It is true that Old Chinese (from the Han dynasty and earlier) was the first Sinitic language associated with Huaxia to be introduced to the south (that is, below the Yangtze and Huai rivers), as Zhou, Qin, and Han dynastic control extended to modern-day Fujian, Guangdong, and Vietnam. However, according to such classifications, only the Wu family (originated in the Yangtze River Delta) and the Min family (originated in Fujian) are said to be descended from Old Chinese. The reason is that the way these linguistic classifications separate the Huaxia languages into separate families with distinct parental lineages is actually quite misleading. As brought up before when I noted the various phonological similarities people noticed in the videos I posted, it seems that despite belonging to separate language families, the southern dialects were all influenced by Middle Chinese pronunciations - some more than others, but the influence universally heavy nonetheless.

For example, in the chart above, Hakka is considered to belong to the Gan family, which has no apparent descent from Middle Chinese. Yet for many words, such as "日", the Hakka pronunciation is obviously influenced by Middle Chinese rather than Old Chinese, since its pronunciation "ngit" is virtually identical to the Middle Chinese /ȵiɪt̚/.

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  • Dialectal data▼
You can also see that the Min pronunciations of this character are more similar to Old Chinese (although this isn't always true). Also note the Taishanese pronunciation is virtually identical to that of Hakka - and by extension, Middle Chinese - while the Cantonese pronunciation "jat" is quite divergent, reflecting the historical losses of the "i" medial and initial consonant "ng" in Cantonese. The contradiction is quite evident if you consider that Taishanese belongs to the Yue family, which is shown as deriving from Middle Chinese, while the Gan family (to which Hakka belongs) is only shown as deriving from Old Chinese.

I think this contradiction reflects how the regions of origin of the language families said to be derived from Old Chinese have had much longer and more relatively isolated Huaxia influence from the ancient period. In other words, Wu/Min regions had an early influx of Han settlers from the Central Plains who spoke Old Chinese, and this founder population retained a much longer influence in those regions as reflected by lasting Old Chinese linguistic influence - whereas, although the Lingnan region/Guangdong initially came under imperial rule after the Qin southern conquest, the founder population of Qin/Han settlers was later overwhelmed by Middle Chinese-speaking migrants from the north in the time of the Tang and Song dynasties. Hence Middle Chinese came to be the dominant linguistic influence in Yue-speaking regions.

Don't get me wrong; the grouping of dialects into separate language families is still valuable. For example, the Min languages retain many Classical Chinese (which is often considered to represent the Old Chinese vernacular) terms in their vernacular, whereas by the Tang and Song dynasties many of these terms were already falling into disuse and relegated to literary/Classical Chinese usage only. Therefore, these terms also did not make their way into the dialects said to be derived from Middle Chinese only.

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Quite a few words from the variety of
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spoken in the state of
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, where the ancestral language of Min and Wu dialect families originated, and later words from
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as well, have retained the original meanings in Hokkien, while many of their counterparts in
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have either fallen out of daily use, have been substituted with other words (some of which are borrowed from other languages while others are new developments), or have developed newer meanings. The same may be said of Hokkien as well, since some lexical meaning evolved in step with Mandarin while others are wholly innovative developments.

This table shows some Hokkien dialect words from Classical Chinese, as contrasted to the written Chinese standard, Mandarin:

Meaning Hokkien Mandarin
Hanji
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Hanzi
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eye 目睭/目珠 ba̍k-chiu 眼睛 yǎnjīng
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箸 tī, tū 筷子 kuàizi
to chase 逐 jiok, lip 追 zhuī
wet 潤 jūn, lūn 濕 shī
black 烏 o͘ 黑 hēi
book 冊 chheh 書 shū
 
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