Ancient Chinese Culture
Archive for category Life of Ancient Chinese
Longevity Noodles
Posted by ancient chinese culture in Drink & Food on August 26, 2009
Longevity noodles stand for longevity in Chinese culture. Due to its special meaning, it is a popular dish on birthdays and other celebratory occasions. Traditionally, longevity noodles are made with a single lump of dough. The dough is stretched, then folded and stretched again until each fold creates thin threads of noodles. The process will not be finished until there are a thousand strands of noodles.
When you get a chance to enjoy it, try not to break off the noodle you are picking up, since it is believed that the longer the noodle is, the longer it suggests your life will be.
Tanghulu
Posted by ancient chinese culture in Drink & Food on August 13, 2009
Tanghulu, literally means sugary gourd, is a popular traditional snack in northern China. The typical ones are of hardened sugar coating, but versions can also be found with a second chocolate coating, or sesame sprinkles.
Its history can be traced back to the Song Dynasty (960-1279). There is a story about the origin of this snack. One of the imperial concubines of Emperor Xianzong (1147-1200) was bedridden for several days. One day, an itinerant doctor said he was able to cure the concubine. After feeling her pulse, the doctor prescribed hawthorns with crystallized sugar for the next fifteen days. He promised the concubine would get well if she followed the prescription. At last, the concubine duly recovered. Due to the good taste of the medicine, it later became a popular snack in ancient China.
Originally, the fruits used for making Tanghulu are Chinese hawthorn. With the changes of eating habit, various kinds of fruits, including strawberries, blueberries, pineapples, kiwifruit,grapes and so forth, can be found in Tanghulu now.
Nowadays, Tanghulu can be found in many cities in China. Strongly suggest you have a taste.
Dragon Robe
Posted by ancient chinese culture in Chinese Clothing on June 26, 2009
In Chinese culture, the dragon represents power. Therefore, it was associated with Chinese emperors as early as the Zhou Dynasty (11th century-256 B.C.) when emperors began to wear robes with the figures of dragon. However, they were named as dragon robes until the Qing Dynasty.
The figure nine and five was associated with the dignity of throne in ancient China. Therefore, a dragon robe is embroidered with nine yellow dragons, on the front, the back, before or behind knees, shoulders and lining of the chest. The upper class were permitted to wear the robes decorated with three, four or five clawed dragons according to their ranks.
The end of the Qing Dynasty brings an end to the dragon robes. Fortunately, we still can appreciate them in some museums now, having a glimpse of the supreme dressmaking technique in ancient China.
the Lightest Silk Clothing
Posted by ancient chinese culture in Chinese Clothing on June 20, 2009
With 1.60 meters long, long-sleeved and as light as 48 grams, the plain voile Buddhist garment which was unearthed from Tomb No.1 of Mawangdui Han Dynasty Tomb is the lightest silk clothing in chinese history.
It is light as the mist and as fine as gossamer. Since it was so light, the upper class of that time always wore more than 10 pieces of this kind of clothing for formal occasions.
And why the cloth is so light? The research found out that “silk worms from that era were much smaller than today’s variety, thus they could spin silk that was much thinner and lighter than today’s silk worms.” (Thanks for Vi’s comment!) Scients even took 13 years to do the research. They fed the certain silk worms which were close to those in the ancient times and then used the silk they spun to make a duplicate.
Hanfu
Posted by sharon in Chinese Clothing on May 6, 2009
Hanfu or Han Chinese clothing, also known as Silk Robe in English, refers to the clothing worn by the Han Chinese people, the predominant ethnic group of China, for millennia until the establishment of the Qing Dynasty in 1644.
Han Chinese clothing are cross-collar, right lapelled, waist-hugging, tied knots and in some cases, complete with belt hooks and other accessories. The style of clothing is elegant and unrestrained.
Due to the ancient culture exchanges, many traditional costumes of East Asian countries, such as the Kimono in Japan and the traditional Korean dress, etc. have been influenced by Hanfu. However, under the rule of Qing Dynasty, all the people were strictly forced to wear the Manchurian style of dress and that largely eliminated the traditions of wearing Hanfu.
Nowadays, the charm of Hanfu is rediscovered and a movement called “Hanfu Movement” has been launched by some Chinese people who are passionate about traditional culture.
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