Jade Shoes With A Long History In The World

In the Museum of Nanyue Wang, Guangzhou, a collection of "silk thread jade coat" unearthed from the tomb of Nanyue King was collected. The jade coat was the southern Vietnamese King's clothing. It was divided into five parts: headgear, jacket, gloves, trousers and shoes. It was 1.73 meters long and shared 2291 pieces of jade. When the jade garment was unearthed, the silk thread had been rotted away, and the jade pieces were scattered in the tomb room. Later, it took the experts more than three years to repair and restore them. Two pairs of shoes are made of red silk thread, and the jade pieces are polished and smooth. It is reported that the shoes are 29.5 centimeters long, 10.5 centimeters wide and 12 centimeters high, sharing 217 pieces of jade tablets, such as rectangles and trapezoid. At that time, although the Nanyue country, which was located in the southern part of the country, was separated from the Han Dynasty, but in many ways it deliberately imitated the Han system, it was not surprising that the Nanyue King was wearing mourning clothes after death.

The history of jade worship in China is very long. It can be traced back to the Neolithic period. Archaeology has proved that since the Neolithic age, jade was widely used for decoration, sacrifice, funeral and other activities because of its superstitious worship of jade. Before its death, the funeral custom of jade buried after death was passed down from generation to generation. In 1968, Manchu County, Hebei Province, for the first time, unearthed two sets of complete and precious jade thread garments, and the jade coat was the costumes of the couple in the Western Han Dynasty, Liu Sheng, king of Zhongshan. They were also made up of five parts: the head cover, the jacket, the trousers, the gloves and the shoes (Figure 2). Jade clothing, known as "jade box" and "jade jade", is made of jade tablets with various shapes. It is said that it can make the dead body immortal. Jade garment production process is complex and huge project. First, we need to cut up large pieces of jade and grind all kinds of thin slices according to the different shapes of human parts, such as rectangles, squares, trapezoidal, triangular, quadrilateral, polygons, etc., and then drill holes in the four corners of jade pieces. The precision and technological requirements for punching holes are very high. According to the test, some saw joints on jade tablets are only 0.3 millimeters, and the diameter of drilling holes is only 1 millimeters. It is also very particular about the selection of jade materials, such as the jade thread of the golden hamstring unearthed from the tomb of Chu king in Xuzhou, consisting of more than 4000 pieces of jade. Jade tablets are of different sizes, which are thin and bright. They all use Xinjiang Hetian jade, and such exquisite jade garments are rare in our country.

In the Eastern Han Dynasty, a set of complete hierarchy of jade clothing has been developed and formed. According to the historical book, the Han Dynasty instrument contains: the imperial collapse, containing beads, and twining twelve. Take jade as an object, like armor, even with a seam, with gold as the thread. Take the jade below the waist for a length of one foot, (wide) two inches and half, for the Hun, down to the foot, also sewn with gold thread. "After the Han Dynasty book of etiquette" is also detailed: "the princes, the emperor, the first seal, the princess, all give the seal, jade and silver." It can be seen that in the Eastern Han Dynasty, jade clothing has been clearly divided into three grades: gold thread, silver thread and copper thread. Only the emperor can only enjoy the jade cloth when he dies, and the princes can only use silver thread jade clothes when they die. Ordinary aristocrats and long princesses can only wear copper thread jade clothing. Jade clothing is a unified supervision of the Imperial Palace, and is bestowed by emperors to princes and royalty. In the production process of jade clothing, the Eastern Han Dynasty is also more mature than the Western Han Dynasty, and there are many new improvements, such as: shoes can distinguish the left and right directions, gloves have appeared fingers, and so on, so jade clothing can fit the human body when dressed. Since 1968, Manchu County in Manchu County, Hebei province has been excavated from the Western Han Dynasty, with the golden hamstring jade clothing. About more than 40 pieces of gold, silver, copper and jade garments have been found everywhere in the Han Dynasty, most of them are intact. This custom of the world's rare jade carcass lasted until the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. During the Three Kingdoms period, Cao Pi, Wei Wei emperor, banned the use of "Zhuyu jade box" in the light of the fact that "Han's tombs are all excavated, and they are burning jade boxes and golden hamstrings." so far, the custom of collecting and dressing jade clothes in Chinese history for more than three hundred years has been abolished.