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| Marriage custom of Miao Minority | Marriage custom of Miao Minority
The typical Miao family is small and monogamous. Aged parents are usually supported by their youngest son. In some areas, a son's name is followed by his father's, but generally a Miao person uses only his or her own name. Influenced by the Han feudal patriarchal clan system, the Miaos made efforts to maintain their family pedigrees, built ancestral halls and adopted words in their names to indicate their position in the family hierarchy.
Marriages are usually arranged by parents, but unmarried young men and women have the freedom to court. Mass courting occasions sometimes take place during holidays, when young women from a host village gather to sing antiphonal love songs with young men from neighboring villages. If a couple is attracted to each other, they exchange love tokens. But they must still win the approval of their parents before they can marry.
Yaos' marriage custom
The Yaos have intriguing marriage customs. With antiphonal singing as a major means of courting, youngsters choose lovers by themselves and get married with the consent of the parents on both sides.
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Yaos' marriage custom | However, the bridegroom's family used to have to pay a sizeable amount of silver dollars and pork as betrothal gifts to the bride's family. Some men who could not afford the gifts had to live and work in the bride's families and were often looked down upon.
In old Yao families, the mother's brothers had a decisive say in crucial family matters and enjoyed lots of other privileges. In several counties in Guangxi, for example, the daughters of the father's sisters were obliged to marry the sons of the mother's brothers. If other marriage partners were proposed the betrothal gifts had to be paid to the mother's brothers. This, perhaps, was a remnant of matrilineal society.
Night wedding
Night wedding is a wedding custom in Zhuang area in Northern Guangxi. It is also called "torch wedding". At wedding night, bridegroom will bring with him 20 to 30 lads, carry torches, walk and sing to go to the bride's home. Near the village of the bride's, they will sing in antiphonal style with the girls who are accompanying the bride. Generally, lads will win in singing. Then an eloquent lad will go near the bride's home and be stopped and questioned by the girls, when the lad gives right answers, he is allowed to go inside to meet the bride.
On the way, the bride is accompanied by 20 to 30 girls, walking and singing in antiphonal style with the lad who came to meet the bride. With songs and laughs, the bride comes to the bridegroom's home to get married by kneeling before the parents. Then the new couple go to the bridal chamber while other young people continue to sing until daybreak. By the way, someone makes friends and probably there will be some more new couples.
The Wedding Custom of the Zhuang Nationality
The zhuang people in some area, such as Longsheng County have the custom of carrying a bride on the back, cutting a ladder, tearing a bridge and singing in artiphonal style at wedding. When a bride marries, a man who has parents alive, a son and a daughter or the bride's father will carry her on his back out of the gate. This is called carrying a bride. Being carried, the bride must be barefoot and wears shoes out of the qate, which means her footprint is outside and she will be linked with her husband from now on, and also implies that she is reluctant to go away from home. The bride,
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The Wedding Custom of the Zhuang Nationality | accompanied by village girls and a singer, will not sit on a sedan when she gets to her bridegroom's home. Of her dowry are some gifts: a pair of now shoes and a suit of clothes for her husband, an apron respective to mother-in-law and an aunt, a waist belt respective to father-in-law and an uncle.
When a bride comes to her bridegroom's home, she has to climb a ladder upstairs and go down a bridge to her bridal chamber. After her climbing up, a young man whose parents are still alive will cut the new bridge and the ladder, which means that the bride's route of retreat is cut off and she will remain in her husband's home for ever and give birth to children, bring forth a new home and new career. At night, the bride, the singer and the village lads will sing in antiphonal style. The bride goes home the next day and the bridegroom will go to take her back to his home. That night the village girls from bride's place and the singer, and the village lads will sing in antiphonal style again for three nights on end. There are tea songs, songs of praise and love songs. Some young men look for loves by the way. |
