202 1-07-02 photo book (six theories on folk culture)

Qifengchi

Not far from grandma's house is a eunuch's grave, surrounded by cypresses. From the outside, there is no solitary grave. From a gap in the south of the cypress circle, you can see more than a dozen tall eunuch graves sitting motionless in the cypress circle. However, I feel that these eunuchs who have been lying in the grave and mutilated have lived here for a long time. In fact, they don't feel lonely at all. There are stone men, horses, tables and chairs in front of each grave. There are crows croaking in the branches, weasels lurking in the grass, and long worms in caves. On Qingming and Halloween days, people in the village can always give them some money and incense. In addition, there is a tall annual ring tree outside the cypress circle to accompany them. Therefore, those bones that have been buried for more than a hundred years do not seem lonely.

Grandma said that the eunuch's grave was 300 years old, but grandma couldn't tell when the tall annual ring tree was planted or whether it was drilled out of the soil by itself.

The height of the annual ring tree is more than 20 meters, and its brain can cover an autumn wheat field. Stout body, more than a dozen children in the village can come around hand in hand.

Every autumn when it is windy, you can hear the sound of trees shaking leaves when you lie on the kang in the village. The sound spread so far that even eight nearby villages could hear the voice of leaf pickpockets. I heard from my grandmother that it really feels like a fairy tale.

Grandma said that the ringing tree can walk, and its shadow follows people. When people arrive at the door, they say to the ringing tree, Brother Bell Tree, I'm back. Go home. Looking back, the shadow of the ringing tree disappeared.

Grandma said that in the past, sweet potatoes were cooked in the field and someone always stole them. Therefore, every family should send people to keep the sweet potato field overnight and wait until dawn to go home.

Before the day is completely bright, people in the sweet potato field are walking on the field path home, and the cold wind blows the yellow weeds in the field and the leaves falling from the trees, making a creepy sound. Occasionally across the shadow of a beast, suddenly flashed a Lan Huo. Suddenly, I heard a scream that I didn't know whether it was a bird or a beast. What's more, my hands and feet are cold and my forehead is cold. Looking after their sweet potato fields, they hide in a nest made of corn stalks every night, listening to the noise outside with a sickle until dawn, and then go home tired.

A person walking timidly on the road always feels that someone is following him. When he looked back boldly, he found the tall shadow of a big tree following him. When a person arrives at the entrance of the village, the shadow of the tree rings naturally disappears. If he is a timid person, the ringing tree will escort him to his door. When a person speaks to the ringing tree, the shadow of the ringing tree disappears immediately. Whether this is a legend or a true story, everyone in Grandma Village will tell the story of the annual ring tree.

In the era of "breaking the old four and establishing the new four", the eunuch's grave was stripped and the stone chair of the stone table was smashed. Only the tall ringing tree still stands in front of the eunuch's grave, because people with red armbands dare not move axes. Old people say that the annual ring tree is a sacred tree and cannot be moved. If you touch it, the whole family will have a disaster.

Many years later, it was a messy eunuch grave, which had already been covered with weeds, and no trace of the grave could be seen again. Only the tall ringing tree is still standing in the wilderness, looking around. However, the voice of the ringing tree is low and hoarse. After the wind blows, I occasionally hear the sound of branches breaking.

A few years later, a highway passed by, and the tall annual ring tree was bitten off by a chainsaw, and its old and bony body was easily placed. Its fallen body and the land it hit were shaking, and the trees in Waiba Village felt the shaking of the earth. The villagers in Waisiba Village also heard and felt the loud sound of the fallen tree. As if the sound, as if the body of the ringing tree hit them, the pain was the same.

Later, I heard from my grandmother that the body of the bell tree was divided into many pieces of wood. Many old people in the village use annual ring trees as coffins, and feel that it is a blessing to lie in the coffin of annual ring trees after death. Finally, my grandmother was lying in a coffin made of a ringing tree.

A few years ago, when I went back to my hometown, I saw many fresh saplings growing in a graveyard in the south of Grandma's village. No one can tell what kind of saplings they are, but when the wind blows through the cemetery, the green leaves of those saplings make sounds very similar to the bells of trees.

Xiashuiguan

There are many local customs and habits in China's folk funeral culture. These customs have been handed down for a long time. As for when these customs were handed down, and what details and sayings these customs have, elderly people can still tell some. However, people can't tell where these customs come from or in which book they are recorded. They just know how to handle funerals and what mourners should do. I think, because these folk sayings and stresses are oral, there is no detailed written record. So in the folk, especially in the countryside, if someone dies, it will be done according to local customs and what some old people say. Over the years, I have also participated in the funeral activities of many relatives and friends, and made some records on the process and details of the funeral. I have consulted many husbands and old people about putting down the pitcher in the coffin of the deceased, but I have not been able to get a detailed answer. I also found a sentence in The Complete Works of Red and White Directors.

As long as I can remember, I knew that there must be a pitcher and a goldfish bottle in the coffin of the deceased. What do you mean by putting down the pitcher and goldfish bottle? What's the saying? I asked a lot of people who arranged funerals, and they just knew how to put these things. No one can tell what the specific statement and precautions are. Later, I specially bought a very thick Complete Works of Red and White Directors in the bookstore. I read it from beginning to end and didn't find a word about the pitcher. It seems that the author who wrote this book did not know the function and explanation of water tanks in tombs.

After many funerals, I learned from the contents of the water tank that the Yin culture left by our ancestors may have been put into the water tank for the sake of food and clothing for the next generation of children and a bumper harvest of crops in the land. As for the bottle with goldfish on it, it also represents wealth.

I clearly remember that in the last century, before cremation, people were buried in coffins. On the head of the red coffin, the name of the deceased is written below, and there is a pitcher and a goldfish on the coffin table. I didn't know the purpose and significance of putting two bottles at that time. Now, goldfish bottles are no longer put in coffins. People release goldfish in rivers or ponds near cemeteries. According to today's statement, one is for ecology and the other is for the regeneration of the dead. So I let the fish go. This is the current practice and saying, and in the past, water tanks and goldfish bowls were always buried with the dead.

I've been wondering why I put those things in the pitcher. Why do people put rice, rice, millet, millet and other crops with skins in a big bottle, insert two green onions, two chopsticks and two sorghum stalks, wrap cotton on the sorghum stalks and put a handful of vermicelli in it? Wrap it in white cloth, revealing green onions, chopsticks, sorghum stalks, cotton and vermicelli. Then tie the movable buckle with colorful thread, put it in a pitcher, held by the eldest son and daughter-in-law at the funeral, and send it to the cemetery for burial.

I have also organized some funerals in recent years. During the funeral, I consulted many teachers who wrote curtains, and asked the old people many times what they meant by putting green onions, vermicelli, chopsticks, sorghum stalks, cotton and grain seeds in a pitcher, and where these statements came from. The gentlemen's answer is very reluctant and vague. Older people can't explain clearly. I really explain these things to the husband and the old man who intend to write accounts. I understand that putting these things means omen and hope. Let the descendants of the deceased have plenty of food and clothing, and the country's agriculture will be harvested. My simple summary was recognized by the undertaker and the elderly.

I added, in fact, putting a pitcher in the coffin of the deceased and moving the grave of the deceased, putting carrots in the grave where the bones were found, and scattering rice is the same meaning.

As for the Chinese custom, which has lasted for hundreds or even thousands of years, it doesn't matter what you say about putting the pitcher in the coffin. I think, as long as future generations remember the cultural traditions left by our ancestors, don't throw them away, don't forget to put down the pitcher when relatives and friends are buried, and more importantly, never forget those dead relatives and friends.

I think this is the deeper meaning of putting the pitcher in the coffin of the deceased.

Let us remember the traditions of the Chinese nation, remember the folk customs of these unwritten nations, and pass on the Yin culture left by our ancestors.

Qianfen

On the south bank of Shahe River in Tangshan, there is a cemetery that has been deserted for a hundred years and turned into a prime location overnight. Many developers and private entrepreneurs built their factories in a terrible place where weasels, foxes and wild dogs used to haunt. Since then, this ghost of Eight Villages in the four corners outside the net has been curled up with paper money all the year round. Even in the century-old cemetery where weasels and foxes dare to walk and entertain in broad daylight, weasels and foxes will never be seen again. People who pass by here at night can't hear the creepy ghosts anymore.

The soul sleeping in the cemetery has been uneasy before the funds of developers and private enterprise bosses have flowed to this dry and deserted ghost land. Because the tombstone standing in front of each grave is affixed with the notice of moving the grave stamped by the local civil affairs bureau. Therefore, the souls who have slept here for a hundred years and the dead who have just fallen asleep here will be clothed with dark blue cloth and ghost-lit, holding red banners of sorghum straw paste and moving to new places to live.

In this desolate cemetery, my two uncles (my wife's brother) lived quietly. They lived quietly here for many years. Every year on holidays, my wife and I will come here to visit them, give some paper money and shed some tears. This year in Tomb-Sweeping Day, my wife and I just pulled up the weeds on their graves and added a few shovels of new soil. This is our last visit and comfort. We know that after planting the last shovel in Tomb-Sweeping Day this year, we will go to other places for Halloween after the autumn, and then send money to our two uncles. Because, on my uncle's tombstone, I also posted a notice to move the grave.

After learning the news, my wife and I discussed how to move my uncle here. Because moving the grave is a major event in the homes of ordinary people in China, moving the grave is not a simple trivial matter, and there are many details and arguments here. Simply put, it is tantamount to moving the incense of our ancestors. It's said that people pay much attention to moving graves, which may bring disaster to families and future generations. I have read the book Yin and Yang in Feng Shui before, and I still remember some details and statements about moving graves in the book. Now it is superstitious in some people's eyes, but analyzing the details in the book does have the deep truth of China Yin culture. Don't believe it, sometimes it's really a disaster.

In the northeast of my uncle's grave, less than 30 meters away, there are two high and prominent graves, which make people know at a glance that they are the graves of rich and powerful people. I heard that Mr. Feng Shui was invited when choosing the cemetery, and Mr. Feng Shui shook his position with a compass. As a result, the direction of the monument rushed to the southwest. I found something wrong when I went to the cemetery to burn paper for my uncle. The 45-degree orientation belongs to the ghost gate line, which is taboo. Besides, the direction pointed by the tombstone is just the tall chimney erected by the steel mill. How unlucky it is that the tombstone is facing the chimney. As expected, just after the first month of this year, the owner of his family was seriously injured by a car and almost died.

I don't know what rules they followed when they moved the grave and erected the monument. The book says that the first thing to do when moving a grave is to choose a good date and time. Generally, after midnight, it is time for ghosts to come out for activities. When moving the grave, you should bring four kinds of tributes, as well as paper money, incense, red cloth, red banners, red gloves, firecrackers and other supplies. After zero, the family quietly went to the desolate cemetery, burning paper to pray first. The content of prayer is probably to tell ancestors or elders that he will move today, ask him what he needs to bring to get ready, and move when he is ready. After these procedures are completed, the eldest son or grandson first digs three shovels of earth on the grave, then holds a red banner around the grave three times and lights firecrackers. After that, the helpers began to dig graves. The location of the grave digging is generally due south. After digging the grave, open the coffin lid, put on red gloves to pick up the bones, cover them with blue cloth, put them in black bags and wrap them in red cloth. The remains were left by the eldest son or grandson. Take the bones out of the coffin and don't leave them empty. Put a carrot and whole grains such as sorghum, millet and rice in the empty coffin. There is also a saying that the purpose of putting these things is to put a carrot, which is a pit for radish, and to put grains to make seeds germinate and grow, which indicates the prosperity of future generations.

After the bones were moved to the new cemetery, the family first pasted the coffin with white paper, covered it with white cotton, and then put the bones in. Family members tell them that they have moved to a new home, and we will send it to you if necessary. Put the bones on the right side of the coffin, cover it with red cloth, then put in what the deceased liked before his death, or sprinkle some small change to cover the coffin. After sealing the coffin, the cannon fired. Then, spread a piece of white paper and arrange the tributes, including fruits, snacks, half-baked meat and wine. When the incense was lit, the family began to burn paper. Then put the red banner on the right side of the grave. After all the formalities were finished, the wine was poured around the grave, and the family said a few farewell words and went back.

In the three-day round grave, three sorghum stalks were used to build a house on the grave, and the sorghum stalks were folded into rectangles and inserted on the grave, with the middle high and the front and back low, thus building the house. Then pull out the red banner and throw it aside. Say a few more prayers and burn paper at the grave after May 7th.

This is the whole process of moving the grave. This is how my uncle moved into his new house. Looking for my grandfather in Shandong

On the first day of the holiday in May this year, I suddenly received a strange phone call from Tianjin. It was a lady on the phone. She claims to be surnamed Xu and wants to know about the land situation in Shandong. This Ms. Xu said that she contacted me after reading my article "Land of Shandong" in an American newspaper, and then found my phone number through a friend. She said that her grandfather worked underground in Linxi Coal Mine in Kailuan in the late 1930s. 1939 was betrayed and arrested by traitors in a struggle to organize miners' strike. Imprisoned in a Japanese prison,/kloc-0 was killed by Japanese devils in the autumn of 944. She also said that after grandpa's death, because no family claimed the body, grandpa's body was thrown on Huangshagang in the north of Shahe River in Linxi. It was a fellow villager in Shandong who secretly buried his grandfather's body in a cave in Shandong. At that time, even the tombstone was afraid to stand.

After liberation, her family inquired about her grandfather's whereabouts. Later, she heard a clue that her grandfather was from Daming Prefecture, Shandong Province, and was sent to Kailuan 1930 to do underground work. In the 1990s, they came to Tangshan Martyrs Cemetery and Kailuan Archives to inquire about grandpa's whereabouts. Her grandfather's name was indeed found in the archives of Tangshan martyrs. But where the martyr's bones are buried is not recorded in the data, and the administrator is not clear. Finally, they can only return to Tianjin in disappointment.

In 2009, Ms. Xu's grandmother died at the age of 100, and her family planned to combine her grandmother's ashes with grandpa's ashes. However, my grandfather's remains have not been found. Just as they were worried about the whereabouts of grandpa's remains, Ms. Xu's relatives in the United States called her and said that she had read an article about Shandong land in Sing Tao Daily. The situation described in the article is likely to find the whereabouts of their grandfather, and perhaps their grandfather may be buried in the land of Shandong. Hearing this important information, Ms. Xu tried her best to find me.

On the phone, I told her the situation and location of the land in Shandong. In a few days, their whole family came to Shandong.

Shandong Laidi is located in the north bank of Shahe River in the southwest of guye district forest region in Tangshan City. According to the local old man, this desolate cemetery is called Shandong Laidi. In this cemetery, there are thousands of Shandong people and their descendants who moved to Kailuan Linxi Mine to dig coal. Calculate, from the 1920s to the present, there are four generations of Shandong people buried in the fields in Shandong.

Linxi Mine in Kailuan was built in 1890 by Tang and big nose British in Qing Dynasty. After the completion of the coal mine, a large number of fleeing Shandong people came to the coal mine to dig coal.

Kind, simple and sincere Shandong people pooled their money to buy a deserted sand hill in the north of Linxisha River, in order to have a home after the death of their fellow villagers. Since then, Shandong people have died and their bones have been buried.

Before liberation, there were frequent underground deaths in Kailuan Coal Mine, and a new grave appeared almost every three days in Shandong Province. In recent years, the wasteland in Shandong has gradually expanded outward, and by the early days of liberation, the wasteland in Shandong has been very large. Seeing such a large cemetery gives people the impression that the dead are competing with the living for territory.

The cemetery is overgrown with weeds and dense shrubs, making it difficult for people to enter. You can see weasels and wild dogs in the cemetery when you pass by during the day. When I was a child, I often heard adults say that there were ghosts in the fields. What I remember most clearly is that in this cemetery, at one or two o'clock at night, I can hear women crying for their husbands and mothers crying for their sons. And people who pass by here at night often encounter ghosts hitting the wall. Whether these stories and legends are true or not cannot be verified. Besides, no one wants to explore secrets in the wild at one or two o'clock at night.

Today, the land in Shandong is no longer desolate. The descendants of Shandong people pulled up grass on graves, and some graves also set up marble tombstones. The once desolate wasteland has changed.

Passing by here now, I feel a sad folk culture. In order to make the ancestral graves full of incense, some descendants of the deceased who were rich officials decorated them into places with cultural taste. Some imitate the luxury houses in the south, and some imitate the tombs of ministers in the Qing Dynasty. In short, the land in Shandong is no longer desolate and sad.

Ms. Xu's family did not find her grandfather's grave in other places, but they were not disappointed. One thing is certain, their grandfather was buried here. However, their grandfather is not sure which grave has no tombstone. Finally, they had to hold two handfuls of soil in a grave without tombstones, wrap them in red cloth and take them back to Tianjin.

Ms. Xu told me in the last phone call that when the ashes of her 100-year-old grandmother were combined with the remains of her grandfather, according to local customs, the soil and blue bricks were wrapped in a red cloth, which was equivalent to the remains of her grandfather. Then, put grandma's ashes next to grandpa's bones, even if the two old people are one. Since then, this has been a major event in their hearts.

Curtain picking paper

In the northern folk, the first thing undertaker should do is to screw up the curtain cloth first, and wait until the curtain cloth is screwed up and hung up before approving the disaster. This is a rule that has been passed down for hundreds of years. According to the person who twisted the curtain cloth, the function of the curtain cloth is to store the soul of the deceased. If curtain cloth is not hung in the home of the deceased, it means that the soul of the deceased will float in the air forever, and there is nowhere to put it. When the curtain paper is hung out, it is considered that the soul of the deceased has a place to store it.

After hanging the curtain paper, the funeral department can hold the funeral for the dead, and the funeral for the dead in the north is also very particular. Generally, people with a little common knowledge of folklore know that men take the exam first and women take the exam first. After hanging up the casualty list, the deceased can be buried. After these three things are completed, they will officially enter the process of mourning the dead.

According to the mourner's husband, the choice of paper for hanging curtains is decided by the descendants left by the deceased. The dead have several generations, so they will twist a few. The way to pick curtain cloth is to cut a piece of yellow paper into four parts. If there are descendants, divide the paper into three parts and cut it where the two sides are folded. Don't cut. Two, three and four generations will twist according to this folding and cutting method. After twisting, twist a corner obliquely on the last piece of paper, with the woman twisting inside and the man twisting outside. After kinking, press a stack of three or four pieces of paper, shake off one end, shake off all the knotted curtain paper, wrap the held end with white cloth, tie it tightly with white cloth strips, and leave a button to tie the stick. Finally, tie the curtain paper to a bamboo stick or a wooden stick and hang it at the gate. Hang it up according to the saying that men are left and women are right, pick up the curtain cloth and post the funeral list of the deceased.

Before the funeral of the deceased, take off the curtain cloth and wrap it in the clothes of the deceased, which is equivalent to dressing the deceased. Then put away the curtain cloth wrapped in white cloth with a hat or paper man, and then enter the room where the deceased lives with the ghost speaker. The horn goes in front, followed by the uncle of the deceased to light the way. The eldest son of the deceased took the curtain cloth and chanted that the deceased had left. After finishing these procedures, another speaker led him out of the room.

After loading the dead into the hearse, you can burn the curtain paper. Finally, the eldest son of the deceased broke the pottery rice screen for steaming rice, walked backwards to the hearse and took the deceased to the cemetery.

This is the function and statement of mourning people in the north and picking up curtain cloth. As for the function and statement of curtain paper, the source is unknown, and so far I have not found the source and exact text information. I just read, listened and made some simple records for people's reference.

Mass graves under the industrial park

After the bankruptcy of Tangjiazhuang Coal Mine in Kailuan, Tangshan, the coal mine was rapidly transformed. Several rich enterprises immediately entered the bankrupt coal mine. A year later, Tangjiazhuang Mine in Kailuan took on a new look. A new modern industrial park has sprung up on the old site. Then the completion of the second phase of Dongfang Power Plant is just around the corner.

After the second phase project of Nantaoshan Cemetery in Tangjiazhuang Coal Mine was approved, a large-scale grave removal project began. Because thousands of bodies killed in the earthquake were buried under the hillside several kilometers in Fiona Fang. Such a big grave sweeping project is not a project that can be completed in one day or two.

After the notice posted by the government was broadcast on TV, people began to move the bodies of their loved ones to Fushan Temple Cemetery. Those graves without relatives were leveled by rumbling forklifts. However, there is a bigger grave that cannot be moved, and that is the mass grave halfway up Taoshan Mountain. What these builders don't know is that there is a mass grave just below the second phase of the power plant under their feet.

On July 28th, the day after the Tangshan earthquake, 1976, the PLA came to guye district and began to dig people under the ruins. After the PLA pulled the body out, it was put in a white plastic bag. Then put it on the liberation dump truck. When the truck is full, it will be towed to Taoshan in the north. I saw a liberation dump truck pulling the body on the side of the road where we temporarily lived, and the rotting body flowed out of the soup all the way. The path thousands of meters up the mountain was muddy with soup from the body. Those flies as big as mung beans on the road directly hit people. At that time, my simple house was built on the road to Taoshan. So, every day I can see a dump truck pulling a corpse passing by my door.

On the fourth day after the earthquake, we pulled my cousin out before he died. The day after it was pulled out, my cousin died of excessive blood loss and the wound rotted.

On the fifth day after the Tangshan earthquake, when my cousin and I went to Taoshan to bury my uncle, I stood on Taoshan at an altitude of 500 meters and looked down. I saw several red Dongfanghong forklifts parked halfway up Taoshan Mountain. I can see clearly that under the forklift is a deep ditch with a width of10m, a length of 50m and a depth of10m.

At eight o'clock the next morning, when we were going to my cousin's grave, we saw dump trucks pulling bodies one after another heading for Taoshan in front of his grave. After filling my cousin's grave with soil, I stood on a relatively high hillside in Taoshan and looked down. Dozens of cars pulling bodies came to Dagou, and the dust along the road rolled up a yellow smoke. After the car stopped in the ditch, the PLA commander held a flag in his hand and blew a whistle in his mouth. The car was very obedient. As soon as the whistle sounded and the national flag rose, the front side of the dumper slowly lifted, and the bodies filled with white plastic bags began to turn into the ditch. The body turned into the ditch was littered, as if sleepy, and fell into the ditch and fell asleep.

When the body almost filled the ditch, I saw the PLA spreading a thick layer of white ash on the body. When the bodies were covered with lime, the PLA came up from the trench. Then more than a dozen bulldozers began to bury the bodies. After the body was completely buried, they used bulldozers to press it back and forth until the soil was compacted.

Among the tens of thousands of bodies buried in this ditch, some are family members, and some have no relatives. They are buried together, just like a big family, isolated from the world and living a life without a trace of concern.

Today, they live under a modern industrial park. They don't know what happens in the world during the day, but the lights and rumbling motors in the industrial park keep them awake at night.