Xiao Qi, Wait!

Chapter 77

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I won’t be going into all the details, but I wanted to share a couple things about traditional Chinese weddings along with a few pictures.

Rather than the Christain “I do until death does us part”, the Chinese have the three bows/salutations. The husband and wife first bow to the Heavens, represented by the altar, then to the parents, then to each other. In some weddings, I think depending on the era and location, the husband and wife’s hands are tied with the red decorative ball. I remember when watching My Fair Princess, they were tied together, and when they got pranked in the bridal chamber, the groom ended up being flung around by the bride due to the decorative rope lol.

Bridal chambers vary, however, ancient Chinese chambers pretty different from bridal chambers of Western cultures, so I just wanted to show an example. One thing that’s usually the same though, is that they’re decked in red. Unless the bride is low ranking or unfavored.

To ill.u.s.trate the procession of carriages with the red decorative b.a.l.l.s, I tried to find some wedding processions, but couldn’t quite find a good one. These kinda show you how it would generally look like. Since Xiaoqi already lives in Song fu, she didn’t have to go through this, but usually the bride would be carried from her maternal home. Depending on their statuses and the current time period, the person leading the bridal carriage would usually be the groom or the matchmaker.

Enjoy~

—chiyomira

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