Tang Dynasty Crossing Guide: Chang'an and People's Life Manual

Chapter 26 If You Marry a Tang Dynasty Man (3)
Done yet?Are you done talking?If you can't finish it, I'll quit and wear it back! ——You are so annoyed that you can't bear it anymore, so the irrelevant people finally leave the stage: "The sky intertwined girl crosses the river, and she comes to the world only for human beings. People around are always going away, and her husband and wife are reunited."

Put down the curtain, let you talk to your little husband. "The lady of the palace is slender, and the lady Heng'e dives among the crowd. Weixin wants to imitate her appearance, so I invite others to lower the curtain for the time being."

Finally, the tent was closed, and the lamps and waxes were blown out—everyone should leave, the sky is about to dawn.

When you wake up the next day, you still have to meet your uncle (in-laws), which is another set of cumbersome etiquette.Three months later, I will go to the temple of my husband's family to salute, and officially inform everyone in heaven that I have moved the household registration book into your house. It is still a mess of rules.If you have any breath left by then, let's talk more.This is roughly what weddings in the Tang Dynasty looked like.

Finally added: The above mentioned is the process of the groom personally welcoming the bride and returning to his own home for the wedding.In the Tang Dynasty, there was a very common phenomenon that if the woman’s family was richer and more powerful than the man’s at the time of marriage, or the man’s family was not in the place of marriage, then the whole wedding ceremony would be held at the woman’s home. It is undertaken by the female family.Even for a long time after marriage, the young couple lived in the daughter's house. This phenomenon was taken for granted by everyone. The groom was not the kind of "home-in-law" who was looked down upon by others.

References & in-depth understanding recommendations for this article:
Li Zhengyu. A Study of Ladies and Husbands. Dunhuang Studies, 1987 (2)

"The Poetry of the Women's Husband", "Mrs. Cui's Training for Women", "Barrier Cars" and so on are based on Dunhuang materials, and the author has trimmed and processed the words and sentences for the convenience of readers to read and understand.There is already a big discrepancy with the original text, and the quotation needs to be cautious.

Fighting mistresses, beating mistresses, the married life of spicy housewives in Tang Dynasty

Life after marriage
Traveling to the Zhang family in the Tang Dynasty, you were the third wife, and you, who wear small characters, got married in a glorious manner last time.Do you want to know what your married life will be like?
Your husband, Li Silang, is generally a man of majestic appearance and honest temperament, and his character is fair.So you think, at least try to be a couple first, and don’t rush back to modern times.

Newlyweds always have a sweet period. For example, when your husband and son-in-law go out due to business and are separated in two places, you young couple write letters from home to tell how much you miss, which can be quite interesting.

Datang ×× years, it was a winter, there was a wild goose... Forget it, there was a neighbor who delivered a letter at your door.You opened the outer envelope, unfolded the paper, and struggled to read the traditional and vertical brush calligraphy.

It's been ten years since the farewell, people's letters and letters have been cut off, the winter is very cold, but the three ladies move, and the children are healthy, so I don't want to study abroad today, and I will be safe, but I worry about how to save money at home, and work hard to serve the respected men and women. The lesson is now because the past is slightly attached to the two lines, one by one, Li Sixiang, three ladies and so on
The meaning of this letter is roughly that my husband and I have been studying abroad for dozens of days and have not communicated with my family. (It’s inconvenient not to have a mobile phone or QQ!) The weather is very cold, I hope your wife and your children are all well, and I’m a little worried about whether your living expenses are enough.Try to care for your parents and discipline your children.Because I happened to meet someone who could bring a letter, I just wrote two lines and forgot about it.

As for you, after reading it, nod your head, find out the pen, ink, paper and inkstone at home and prepare to write a reply.After all, she is also an intellectual woman who has received modern education. Isn't it trivial to write a letter to her family?

The company kindly provides the Tang Dynasty letter template:
After the farewell, the road is long and the concubine is worried and described as haggard (husband, if you don’t come back, I will be disfigured, I will blame you) When the day goes away, the clouds will not be much, and the farewell will already be dark (you lie to me and come back after a few days, What have you been doing with your friends and friends for so long now) Mrs. Weng is old and safe, and the size of the house is normal. When Fu Wei Shiro moves, it’s a good thing. It’s time to return to the deep hope. I would like to submit a petition to Zhang’s petition to Li Lang.
Hey, it’s okay to write the brush characters like chaotic firewood and crosses. Can you write in traditional characters, please?Won't?At least write it vertically line by line.I said, should write from right to left, okay?Commas and question marks cannot be used!Do you think that the ancients were as stupid as some scheming props, using word simplified and traditional tools to convert the vernacular, and even print the punctuation on paper, fooling people?
Alas, it's really hard work, the brain-dead time travel drama kills people.What are you trying to do?Looking for stamps and mailboxes with sealed letters?You could just go back and wear it with your laptop and Wi-Fi.You asked whether the official post station is responsible for mailing letters?Unless your husband is already a relatively high-ranking official of the imperial court and has a good relationship with the post station system, the post generals may mix your family letters with government documents and deliver them to the destination. Otherwise, if a commoner wants to send a letter from home through the post station, then Basically impossible.You'd better ask honestly who happens to be going out and passing by your husband's place in the neighborhood, and trust them.

Sweet events like exchanging love letters, such as small love and small tunes, account for a very small proportion of your married life as a woman in the Tang Dynasty.Most of the time, I am afraid that you are painfully adjusted to the various feudal concepts and assholes of the people at that time.

For example, on the first day after your marriage, after going through a lot of trouble at the wedding last night, you finally got up, went to court to pay homage to your parents-in-law, and went through the etiquette that a bride should perform. The maidservant of the family brought in a well-dressed two or three-year-old child, arrived in front of the hall, pointed at you and said to the child: "Hurry up and salute, call your mother!"

You thought it was a relative's child, and you didn't pay attention to it at first, but at this moment your newlywed husband turned sideways and told you with a smile on his face that this is his (concubine) eldest son, nicknamed Ah Yi, and since then That is your son.

Thunder boom, right?Just one night after getting married, she became the mother of a child.Hey, that's not right, when you came to my house to propose marriage, you were a wicked ghost, and you clearly said "the year has been established, and there has been no marriage", and you have never been married. Where did this baby come from?Popped out of the cracks in the rock?
Your husband straightened out his hand and pointed out: "Born by a maidservant." A young maidservant who has been busy since last night with red eyes hurriedly came up and knelt down to you, saying "Wanfu, my lady".This is the biological mother of your husband's son. She started to have sex with the young master long before you, the official wife, entered the house. "Tongfang big girl".

You looked around furiously, but you saw that everyone present looked calm, as if it was only natural and natural for a man to give birth to a maidservant before he got married.Instead, the maid you brought from your natal family hastened forward and whispered in your ear, advising you to show the grace and demeanor of a noble girl, and don't look unhappy, being accused by your husband of being "jealous and intolerable", Even the reputation of the parents' tutoring has been humiliated-what kind of world is this, turn the table!
Pat on the shoulder, there is no way, just bear with it.Those smelly men from good families in the Tang Dynasty all had this kind of virtue.Occasionally, there are one or two people who are clean and self-conscious, and do not engage in maids or prostitutes before marriage. Those are so rare that they will be written into legendary novels, and they will definitely be ridiculed by friends as "too bad" or have a sleeve-cutting addiction.

What are you asking?Since the stinky man and the maid have children, why don't you just marry her and harm you, who is innocent?Alas, maybe your husband really wants to marry his first night "Sister Xiren" as his regular wife—if he is not afraid of both husband and wife doing hard labor.

In the Tang Dynasty, great importance was attached to the "good and humble system". There was absolutely no intermarriage between "beautiful people" such as nobles and commoners, and "sluts" such as slaves and Lehu (specifying that the matchmaker was marrying ).According to the law, if a stinky man appoints his maidservant who belongs to the "low status" as his official wife, the government will intervene and sentence the man to two years of hard labor, and the woman will be sent back to her original class to serve as a maidservant, and she will not be allowed to enjoy the treatment of the royal family.

Even if the maid gave birth to the master's son?Yes, no, if the maidservant gives birth, or even though she has no children, but the master likes her very much, then she must be approved by the government to perform a procedure of "letting her good". You can let her be a "concubine" who is one level higher than the maid (it is also against the law to let her be a concubine directly without being released, and the master will serve one and a half years in prison).

Could it be that there were no concubines in the Tang Dynasty who directly supported their legitimate wives?This... yes, but the premise is that when this concubine enters her husband's house, she is a beloved person and not in a humble family, so that she can be righted.If this concubine used to be a maidservant, then at most she would be at the level of concubine concubine, and she must never be established as a regular wife, otherwise she would be punished for the crime of "taking a concubine as a wife". Prototype.

If this "Sister Xiren" is particularly lucky and really meets a monogamous, loyal and single-minded male master (from time travel?), then her husband's master can never marry a regular wife for the rest of his life, and devote himself to being with his concubines live.As long as he doesn't care about other people's comments and ridicules, no one cares about the seventeen or eight children he and his maidservants have, and because there are no children born by the concubine, the children born by the concubine can also inherit the family property normally.However, this kind of man was probably more precious than Pixiu in the Tang Dynasty. The husband you married is obviously not this kind of person.

Your husband is a fairly normal man, he wants to save face like most people, and his main wife must be a daughter from a good family like you, with good family background, dowry, and good status and upbringing, in order to play her due role in the common "wife diplomacy" of his class .

Over there, a girl who time-traveled said that men in ancient times "let her be a concubine if they love her", pampering and caring for their true love.A loveless arranged marriage wife is used to push her to the forefront to withstand attacks from all directions, and her fate is much more tragic than that of a mistress.So if she wanted to dress up, she would dress up as a mistress, fall in love with the male lead, be sweet, stay together and fly together...

Well then, welcome to dress up as the servant girl of our male master.Be sure to come, if you don't come, you will gain 20 catties a year... (Gearing up)
A white light flashed, and under the watchful eyes of everyone in the family, the maid who gave birth to your husband's son really woke up after passing out. She opened her mouth and spoke pure Mandarin: "What's going on? Did I succeed in time travel?"

Everyone in the family looked at each other—who can understand the Youzhou dialect more than 1000 years later—ask a few more words, and see that she is still full of birdsong. The evil spirit has taken hold of me, hit me with a wooden board!"

The hostess has an order, the servants dare not be negligent, they swung their whips, boards, and canes in circles, and lashed at the servant girl.Among the screams of crying father and mother, you are the only one who understands, and what "Sister Xiren" shouted through time travel is: "Brother Li Si, come and save me..."

Spread your hands, dare she really count on that lover who had the heart to make her a child to stand up for her against his wife?Don't say that the stinky man won't come back for a while, even if he does come back, it's completely reasonable for the mistress to scold the slaves (just as it should be for a stinky man to mess with a maid), not to mention you have a good reason—Little Three Demon How can you exorcise evil spirits?If the evil spirits in her body came out and harmed her parents and relatives because of soft hands, whose responsibility would it be?
In this case (when the slave is guilty or the master "has a legitimate reason"), as the head of the family, even if you "accidentally" beat the slave to death, you will not be guilty.If someone can prove that you intentionally wanted to kill your slaves, which is the situation in the Tang law that "all slaves are guilty, and the master kills them without asking for a lawsuit", your punishment is only "one hundred rods", and you don't have to pay for your life .Even "killing without guilt", the maximum is "one year".

Moreover, out of the consideration of "family ugliness should not be publicized", even if your husband is overwhelmed by the death of his pet maidservant after he comes back, he will basically not report his wife to the government. With a 99% probability, the whole family will say with one voice that the execution was excessive and manslaughter "accidentally".

You said that killing people is always bad, so don't be too cruel to be a human being, just kick Xiaosan out of the house and don't show it in front of your eyes?Well, just ask the servants to call Ren Yazi and sell "Sister Xiren". It's best for the evil star to get out as soon as possible.What did she say?She is the biological mother of the little master, so she can't be sold?Picking the teeth, she's just a lowly maid, even her son doesn't want to recognize her, who takes her words seriously?
Renyazi is here, check the goods and issue a certificate, mistress, you sign and press your fingerprints, accept the price, and quickly take this disaster star away-finish the work.

A few days later, your husband came back.After listening to your narration calmly, for such a 0.001 second, deep sorrow, nostalgia, regret, and nostalgia still burst out in his eyes... But after 0.001 second, he waved away without taking the clouds away. Wave your sleeves to indicate that this is the way to go, then turn around and bring another beautiful maid in front of you.

"Come to meet my lady—this is my new maidservant on the way."

"Where did this come from?"

"My friend Wang Jiu gave me a house prostitute." Your husband looked complacent, as if he had killed the king of thieves and captured the rebel—in fact, he didn't intend to anger you, it was just that friends gave each other maids, Giving prostitutes is a very popular aristocratic style. The giver shows how generous and generous he is, and the recipient feels that he is welcomed and respected everywhere, which is also a matter of great face.Sigh, don't overturn the table, let's take a long-term plan, a long-term plan...

That's right, Li Si, a heartless man, is making such cronies. If he wants to give a woman away, he might as well wash himself up and send him to his bed.If scolding can calm you down, you can scold first, I'll drink some water, call me when you're done scolding, and we'll discuss how to deal with this new vixen.

Drink water and return.Under the strict "good and low system" of the Tang Dynasty, it was a little more difficult for the mistress to kill a slave than to kill livestock.So as long as you are more flexible, there are still many ways to deal with concubines in your own home.

For example, one day he declared that he could not find a set of inlaid gold combs, and asked his confidant maid to lead someone to search it.The confidant found the room of the male master's favorite maidservant, lifted the pillow and mat, raised his hand, and the comb was in sight.Alright, it's okay for a slave to steal something!If you don't beat it up and sell it, what are you waiting for!
For another example, if the stinky man falls in love with a maid again, you send this favored maid to take care of the little master (the son left by the last unlucky girl).Children are always very capricious. When the children yell and cry, you will say that the servant girl intentionally abused the young master, beating...throwing...selling...

Of course, with you throwing out one after another concubines who have an affair with the master, your husband should be aware that something is wrong no matter how careless and heartless you are.At the same time, if you live in the same house with your father-in-law and mother-in-law, and you drive away their grandson's biological mother, it is estimated that the two elders will point fingers in the back.

There is a way to solve this.If your own natal family is powerful in the local area, then the entire husband's family will turn a blind eye and ignore it.If your natal family is average, then the best way for you to consolidate your position in your husband's family is to conceive and give birth to a son.

After two years of arguing and arguing with stinkers, spring arrives and you find out you're pregnant.Pregnancy in the first wife is no small matter, the whole family is overjoyed, they take care of you carefully like the stars, your husband is no exception, and they are very peaceful after a few months.

(End of this chapter)