History can't bear to look at the complete collection

Chapter 99
Women in the Tang Dynasty were always "pregnant in their dreams"

The "Kaiyuan Tianbao Legacy" written by Wang Renyu of the Five Dynasties records a story of a woman who cheated but relied on her dreams: "Yang Guozhong was sent to Jiangsu and Zhejiang. His wife missed him deeply and became ill. Suddenly Meng and Guozhong had friendship. Pregnant, the male name of the offspring. When the envoy returned to Guozhong, his wife told the dream. Guozhong said: "This is because the husband and wife miss each other, and the emotion comes." Everyone laughed at the time."

According to "Old Tang Book?"The Biography of Yang Guozhong" records that Yang Guozhong's wife Pei was born as a prostitute, and she is very charming.Since she can charm Yang Guozhong, naturally she can also charm other men.When Yang Guozhong was away on errands, Mrs. Pei was so lonely that she hooked up with others and gave birth to a baby boy.Ordinarily, Yang Guozhong should not be able to accept it, but when he heard his wife say that he missed him too much and gave birth to a child because he met him in a dream, he actually said that it was because of the deep relationship between their husband and wife.

Being able to easily forgive his wife for cheating and accept the saying of "pregnancy in a dream", in addition to taking into account his own reputation, it also shows that people were more open-minded during the Tang Dynasty.Yang Guozhong's private life is also relatively corrupt, and he is not so strict with his wife.

Of course, "Kaiyuan Tianbao Legacy" records anecdotes and anecdotes during the Kaiyuan and Tianbao reigns of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty, a large part of which is fabricated, and the authenticity is not very high.However, the "pregnancy in a dream" of a woman in the Tang Dynasty actually happened. In the Dunhuang document "The Fragments of Civilization Judgment", a story of "a woman is pregnant in a dream" is recorded.

The authenticity of this story is inferred to be very high, because the "Civilization Judgment Collection Fragments" unearthed from Dunhuang is a collection of cases written by jurists in the early Tang Dynasty. The 19 cases described in the book are all proposed judgment cases at that time.These stories were later brought back to Japan by Japanese envoys as learning materials.

And the story of "pregnancy in a dream" tells: "A Liu, a woman, lost her husband early, she wanted to keep her will, and she was willing to be a sister-in-law. After a few years of her husband's death, she gave birth to a son. The deceased husband had a dream, because she was pregnant. The aunt raised her as her grandson, and she had no other worries. Her brother would be disgraceful, so she went to Zhang Heng privately. The betrothal money has been paid, and it will be paid at the right time. Her younger sister has a true ambition and will never change. The elder brother then replaced his aunt with his daughter , go to the time to become a gift."

In the story, Ah Liu, her husband died young, and she gave birth to a baby boy after being widowed at home for several years.She claimed to be pregnant because she met her deceased husband in a dream.The mother-in-law accepted the grandson, but the husband's elder brother was very ashamed and married A Liu to someone else, but he did not expect that A Liu would refuse to obey, so the elder brother had to replace him with his own daughter.

This story was used in the commentary "Ling Jijie" of the Japanese code "Old-age Order", "pregnancy in a dream" is nonsense, if Yang Guozhong's wife used "pregnancy in a dream" as an excuse, but Yang Guozhong denied it, Then she can also say that she was pregnant before Yang Guozhong went on a business trip.But Ah Liu is a widow. She said that "pregnancy in a dream" can only be because of having an affair with someone else.However, the folk customs in the Tang Dynasty were open. Even if a woman had an affair with others, as long as no one reported it, the government would not pursue it deeply.

Of course, the Tang Dynasty also advocated that women should abide by women's morals. For women who cheated, they were generally sentenced to imprisonment for about one and a half years after being accused.As for the cruel criminal laws such as "soaking pig cages" that are often heard by later generations, they did not gradually rise until after the Song Dynasty.

The woman changed secretly, and in order to cover up her infidelity, she relied on dreams.Dreaming is a matter of course and no one can control it.What happened in the dream is naturally impossible to trace.

(End of this chapter)