A silver vase is drawn from the bottom of the well, and the silver vase is about to be tied up with a silk rope.
Grind the jade hairpin on the stone, and the jade hairpin will be folded in the center.
What can you do if the bottle sinks and the hairpin breaks? It seems that I am leaving you now.
I recall that when I was a girl at home, people spoke and behaved differently.
Chanjuan has autumn cicada wings on her temples, and the two moths are reflected in the distant mountains.
Laughing and accompanying the play in the back garden, I didn’t know you at this time.
My concubine is playing with green plum blossoms against a short wall, and you are riding a white horse next to a weeping poplar tree.
I immediately looked at each other from afar, and my heart broke when I saw you.
I know you are broken-hearted *** your words, you guide the pine and cypress trees in the mountains.
The pines and cypresses that I feel for you turn into my heart, and my two servant girls chase you away.
It has been five or six years since I arrived at Jun’s house, and the adults of the Jun family have spoken frequently.
If she is hired as a wife, she is a concubine, and she cannot bear to be worshiped by the Lord.
Finally, I realized that your home was uninhabitable, so I had no choice but to go out and have nowhere to go.
Are there no parents in the high hall? There is also family love in my hometown.
I couldn’t get any more information from you, so I feel so sad and ashamed that I can’t go home today.
One day of kindness to the king can lead to a hundred years of misunderstanding.
I would like to send a message to you, a stupid little girl, be careful not to give yourself away to others!
The great poet Bai Juyi of the Tang Dynasty once wrote a poem called "Introducing a Silver Vase from the Bottom of a Well", which was later adapted into the famous drama "Horse on the Wall" by Bai Pu of the Yuan Dynasty. Whether it is the original poem or the later drama, the plot revolves around a girl who elopes with her lover. However, compared to the happy ending of the drama, in Bai's poem, the eloped woman cannot be recognized by the groom's family. Being forced to consider myself a concubine will make the future even more miserable. So, is the situation in the poem that "a wife becomes a wife and a concubine becomes a concubine" just an exaggeration by the poet for the sake of art, or is it a true portrayal of the society of the Tang Dynasty?
The highly hierarchical marriage system of the Tang Dynasty
First of all, we might as well take a look at the marriage system at that time. The Tang Dynasty was a society that placed great emphasis on family status and status, and emphasized "according to color and type." At that time, people could be divided into four types according to their status: nobles (officials), good people (farmers, workers, merchants, Baiding), and bitches (miscellaneous households, miscellaneous households, Official household, tribe, guest daughter), slave. Except for the noble and the good who can intermarry with each other, the marriages of these different classes must be carried out in accordance with the legal provisions of "Each person has a partner, and the color and type must be the same. Since the good and the low are different, why should they cooperate?" The law of the Tang Dynasty also stipulates: "Wives, Qi, Qin and Jin are equals. Concubines can be sold and bought, and the number of equals depends on each other." That is to say, the status of the wife is the same as that of the husband, but the concubine can be bought and sold at will, which is far different from the status of the legitimate wife. .
The distinction between wives and concubines is not only clear among the people, but also in the palace without exception. Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty loved Concubine Wu Hui very much in his early years. Although Concubine Wu Hui failed to become a queen, she was treated like a queen in the harem. But even so, when referring to Concubine Wu Hui, the imperial censor who was in the sixth rank in the middle of the imperial court, still dared to point out unceremoniously that "Concubine Hui is the one who holds the turban on both sides" and directly told the emperor that the woman you love is nothing more than Concubine Wu. He is just a servant serving you, and Tang Xuanzong cannot refute this, because what the minister said is the truth.
Not only that, not just anyone can be a concubine. The law of the Tang Dynasty even stipulated the identity of a concubine: "A concubine must marry her husband." Can she become a concubine? Concubines also depend on their status. Only women with a good family background can be concubines. If they are slaves and maidservants with a humbler background (that is, women with a bitch or slave background), they are not even qualified to be a concubine unless they are granted Only when the male master is lucky enough to have children and becomes a "beloved man" can he take her as a concubine. But even if she becomes a concubine, she is still not qualified to become a wife, because the law stipulates very clearly: "Anyone who takes a concubine or a guest girl as a wife, or a maid as a concubine, shall stay for one and a half years. Each of them will return to the right." Dare to use A concubine who becomes a wife must accept a sentence of one and a half years, and after the sentence is over, she still has to return to her original status.
All these systems cannot be said to be unscrupulous, so there are those who occasionally dare to risk the disapproval of the world. Even if they adhere to the principle of "the people will not sue the officials, they will not be held accountable" for their actions. Scorned by mainstream public opinion.
For example, Du You, the author of "Tongdian" who created a new genre of history compilation, insisted on making his beloved concubine Li the main wife after the death of his wife Liang, despite the efforts of his family to dissuade him. It attracted all kinds of criticism. Not only that, after Du You died, only his original wife Liang was buried with him. Even when Quan Deyu wrote the epitaph for his friend, he only recorded the Liang family and did not mention the Li family at all.
This can be seen from the disdainful attitude of people at that time towards the behavior of "taking concubines as wives".
A man who takes a concubine is still considered unmarried
The difference between wives and concubines is also reflected in: even if a man takes a concubine and has children, his legal marriage status Still unmarried. After all, concubinage has always been the exclusive preserve of male aristocrats in Chinese feudal society. "Book of Rites" says: "Princes have wives, married women, wives, and concubines." It's just that concubines have a humble status, no matter how many men have them As long as a concubine has not yet taken a wife, she is unmarried.
This situation was not uncommon in the Tang Dynasty: there were concubines in the family, and even these concubines had given birth to many children, but the men still claimed to be unmarried and unmarried. For example, Yunhui General Wang Hengfan clearly gave birth to two bastards with his concubine or the maidservant around him, but he still claimed to be unmarried, so that after his death, he "left the coffin without ordering the owner of the house to mourn", and faced the problem of having no wife to help him with the arrangements. The embarrassing situation of a funeral.
Although Yuanxiang of Henan had a maid who was a "waiter" who gave birth to a daughter for him, Yuanxiang's cousin still concluded that he would not marry when writing his epitaph. Coincidentally, Yuan Xiang had the same illness as Li Huichang, the single father of the county lieutenant in Songzhou. The family only had two daughters born to Shi Jinzhi and a son and a daughter born to his concubine Jia, so Li Huichang died during the war. It is still the case of "having a poor official position but not marrying".
Lu Quanjiao, who once served as the governor of Fengzhou, was also an unmarried couple. Although he had three sons, the identity of their biological mothers is unknown. On Lu Quanjiao’s epitaph, it is only mentioned as “all written by the same person.” It can be seen that the Lu clan people have a contempt for these concubines, completely ignoring the contribution these women have made to the inheritance of the family's incense during their ten-month pregnancy.
Cui Wei, who went to Yongguan to recruit magistrates and tried Zuo Qingdao, led the government troops to join the army, was also "unfortunate not to marry", but this did not prevent Cui Wei from having a concubine named Zhang and three daughters. However, Cui Wei's situation is slightly special, that is, Cui Wei and Zhang actually held wedding ceremonies such as Nacai, but why did Cui Wei's nephew still say that he was not married when he wrote the epitaph? It turns out that the "Laws of the Tang Dynasty" stipulates "the orders of parents and the words of matchmakers" as necessary conditions for the establishment of marriage, and there is also this article in the law: "If the younger ones are outside, the older ones will be engaged, and the younger ones will marry themselves." If the marriage is completed, the marriage will be in accordance with the law. If the marriage is not completed, the elders will be respected. If there is no one to preside over the marriage, the law will recognize it; if there is an elder to preside over the marriage, the man will marry on his own. If you take a wife, you will be punished with a hundred rods.
So even if Cui Wei and Zhang had a marriage ceremony, but without the consent of their parents, the marriage was still not recognized by the Cui family, and the Zhang family avoided talking about it, and even The incident was deemed "unfortunate".
The heroine in "The Silver Vase at the Bottom of the Well" obviously violated the orders of her parents, let alone the words of a matchmaker, which led to her being abandoned by her husband's family and "unable to worship Pingfan". So much so that they don't even have the right to preside over family affairs and sacrifices.
The concubine can only call his birth mother his aunt
In the strict hierarchical concubine system, it is not only the women who are concubines who have low status, but the concubines are born to the husband's family. Their children also have a humble status. The most typical example is that sons and daughters of a concubine are not allowed to call their biological mother "mother", but can only be called "aunt". And it's not just the common people, it's the same in the royal family. The prince who is a concubine can also only call his biological mother as aunt - no matter how high the biological mother's rank is in the harem.
There is a record in "The History of the Southern Dynasties: The Scholars of Emperor Wu of Qi", "My mother Ruan Shuyuan was critically ill and asked the monks to practice Buddhism. Some offered lotus flowers to the Buddha, and the monks used copper poppies to soak the stems with water. , the flower will not wither. Zi Mao shed tears and bowed to the Buddha and said: "If my aunt is victorious because of this, I hope all the Buddhas will make the flower not wither." "Nanshi Qi Zongshi" also records: "The word "Jun" announces the ceremony. When he was five years old, he was born to a nobleman in the area and became even more miserable. He would often treat him with five-colored snacks and refused to eat, saying, "I have to wait for my aunt to send me."
According to the harem system of the Southern Qi Dynasty, Guiren is the third wife of the first rank, and Shuyuan is the ninth concubine of the second rank. Ou Guiren and Ruan Shuyuan are of high rank in the harem, and Xiao Jun and Xiao Zimao are both filial sons, but because they are concubines, they are not allowed to call their biological mother. "Mother" can only be called "aunt".
Whether they are civilians or royal families, as long as they are born from concubines, these children will never be able to call their biological mothers who gave birth to them in ten months for the rest of their lives. Therefore, the people of the Qing Dynasty concluded in the "Record of Titles": Today, people often call the concubine's mother "aunt", which has a long history.
The essence of this phenomenon of only calling the biological mother as aunt lies in the humble status of the concubine. Her children cannot regard their biological mother as their mother, but can only respect their aunt as their mother. Therefore, when the parents are mentioned on the epitaphs of these concubines and concubines, the mother must refer to the legitimate mother rather than the biological mother.
For example, after the death of Tian Yu’s concubine, her epitaph only mentioned the name of her aunt, Boling Cui. As for her birth mother, she only used the word "born" instead. Another example is that because Li Jifu's great-granddaughter Li was born a concubine, his brother Li Xuanli called his mother "Mrs. Zheng of Xingyang" when writing his epitaph. It was not until the end of the epitaph that he mentioned that his biological mother was actually Chen.
Shi Cui Kui, the imperial censor in the palace, not only called his father’s first wife Wang as his mother, the “first wife”, but after both his father and aunt’s mother passed away, Cui Kui called himself “an early orphan”. Even though Cui Kui's biological mother Lin is actually still alive at this time.
Concubines have no inheritance rights
Children born to concubines not only can only call their biological mother aunt, but the humble status of these concubines is also reflected in other aspects.
Zhang Guan, the Prime Minister of Hailing County, Yangzhou, had two sons. The eldest son was the common son and the second son was the legitimate son. In Zhang Guan’s epitaph, the legitimate son was ranked before the common son. It can be seen that under the patriarchal system, the eldest son was the legitimate son. Young orderliness also had to give way to the distinction between concubine and concubine.
In the early Tang Dynasty, there was a minister named Qiu Xinggong. He followed Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty to eliminate Xue Ju, Liu Wuzhou, Wang Shichong, Dou Jiande and other separatist forces, and achieved great military exploits. After burying his father's concubine, who was his biological mother, Qiu Xinggong was impeached by the judicial department and received the severe punishment of expulsion.
It is against human ethics for a bastard to not be qualified to bury his biological mother. The worst thing that could happen to a bastard is that their inheritance rights are deprived. Although there is a provision in the law of the Tang Dynasty: "If there is no legitimate son or a sinful disease, a legitimate grandson will be established; if there is no legitimate grandson, then the legitimate son will be the same as his mother's brother; if there is no mother's brother, he will be the concubine; if there is no concubine, the legitimate grandson will be the same as his mother's brother; if there is no mother's brother, then he will be the legitimate grandson. "Establishing a concubine as an heir" means that it is possible to establish a concubine as an heir when there is no legitimate son. Unfortunately, this is far from the case.
Fuzhou governor Huangfu Wei successively married the two daughters of Zhongshu Ling Bai Minzhong. However, both Mrs. Bai died early. Huangfu Wei had only one bastard, but in the end he inherited Huangfu Wei's family. It was not the concubine who gained the favor, but Huangfu Wei's nephew. This typical phenomenon shows that if an aristocratic man does not have a legitimate son, he would rather let his nephew succeed him than let his concubine inherit the incense. This shows that the status of a son born from a concubine is so low that he is not even as good as his nephew. And this situation of not treating a concubine as an heir is obviously not an exception. For example, Huangfu Wei could at least have nephews and heirs, while Tang Sili, the supervisory censor, married three wives and died young. Although he had two concubines, Tang Sili did not choose one of the two concubines as his heir. His epitaph simply stated The word "no heir" was added. Although these examples do not mean that all nobles will ignore the inheritance rights of concubines, the low status of concubines is evident from this.
Under such a dehumanizing system, a concubine with a low status could not take care of the family affairs during her lifetime, and could not be buried with her husband after her death. He was buried, and he had no right to inherit the family business. This system of differentiating concubines and concubines can certainly solve problems such as the inheritance of power and property, but it is a serious challenge to human ethics. If the concubine is filial and has a deep relationship with his biological mother, this will be a great torture for both mother and child; if the concubine has a cold temperament and does not bother to acknowledge his biological mother, it will be even more harmful to the biological mother herself.
Looking at the Tang Dynasty’s marriage system with distinction between concubines and concubines and strict hierarchy of superiority and inferiority, it is no wonder that Bai Juyi bluntly told everyone at the beginning of "The Silver Vase at the Bottom of the Well" that his purpose of writing this poem was In order to "stop prostitution", he tried to dissuade young girls from being impulsive for love, "a day of kindness to the king will lead to a hundred years of misunderstanding". After all, for aristocratic men who are accustomed to romantic affairs, challenging the feudal etiquette system will only lead to a romantic affair at most. But for the disadvantaged women in feudal society, if they make a wrong step, they will only face the consequences of being unlucky. Concubine, ultimately affecting the unbearable situation of the children.