Recently in my Japanese history class I had learned about the law of Japan in medieval time and I think it is very interesting when we look back on our own history with a different perspective from our ancestors. Most of the time we probably going to think the ancient people have strange values toward strange things compared to us. Today I am going to talk about the ancient custom about hair in China.
First of all, I bet you guys will be surprised when you know that before Qing dynasty it was illegal to have haircut in China. Then notion of Confucianism tells us hair is a part of the body and it was been granted from your parents to you, therefore to cut your hair has the equal meaning of injury your body, which has been considered as a form of disrespect toward your parents. Actually the notion was weaken over time. Around 650 B.C.E. haircut was a punishment to punish people who commit public disturbance, but later in Chinese history this punishment disappeared from history which symbolized that most people no longer consider haircut as a crime but a violation of public norm. The change of the attitude regards to haircut is largely due to the adoption of Buddhism. We all know Buddhism monks must cut all their hair so it really helped the changing of new idea toward haircut through an ideological approaching.
The next change happened after the invasion of Manchus around 1600s and the occupation followed by. The adoption of Manchu hair style of Chinese was a tool invented by Manchus in order to strengthen their rule in China through the absorption of Manchu customs. Manchu soldiers coercively removed half of the hair of Han people and leaved the other half on the back of person’s head, and made it into a tail. Those who refused to do so were killed, actually the slogan of the government at that time is “keeping your hair then you will lose your head, keeping your head you must cut your hair”
Of course, the next part of the story may sounds much familiar to you guys because it happened in the early 20th century. After the overthrow of Qing dynasty in 1911 and the huge wave of western study, we finally changed into the normal hair style we have by now
Really interesting!