Tujia Folk Beliefs and Culture — The Coming-of-Age Meaning of the Tujia Bridal Lament (Part 2)
The second characteristic is that the process of the woman's spiritual ordeal is often accompanied by parental admonition. As the daughter weeps farewell to her parents, they offer not only comfort but, more importantly, instruction. The admonitions are also sung as laments, mainly urging the daughter to fulfill her duties as a wife and practice filial piety: "My daughter, my heart, be patient in all things..."
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The second characteristic is that in the process of the woman undergoing spiritual suffering and tempering, it is often accompanied by admonitions from her parents. When the daughter weeps in farewell to her father and mother, the parents, besides giving appropriate comfort, mainly give admonitions. The admonitions are also delivered in the form of weeping song, with the main content being to urge the daughter to fulfill her duties as a wife and practice filial piety: "My daughter, my heart and liver, you must be patient a thousand times, a million times. When walking, watch whether the road is high or low; when speaking, distinguish whether people are old or young. You must comply with the feelings of elder and younger brothers and sisters." They urge the daughter to endure hardship and toil: "Cold dishes and cold rice you must eat, cold words and cold looks you must endure. Hard work and bitter toil will fall to you; diligently turn the mill and diligently pound the mortar." They admonish the daughter to conduct herself properly: "Never raise your voice, do not twist your body." To be diligent and frugal: "Rise early and enter the kitchen," "Rise early and embroider mandarin ducks," "Rise early and boil tea and soup." To reverently serve the ancestors: "In the morning you must burn incense, in the evening you must burn paper money." These admonitions, although exuding the stale air of feudal ethical preaching, also contain some worthwhile life experience that, for a woman leaving the protection of her parents and first stepping into the world, is beneficial in any case. These admonitions play a guiding role in the married daughter's life after entering her new family, serving the same function as the admonitions in coming-of-age rituals.
The third characteristic is that the central content of the weeping marriage is "weeping farewell." This is a topic closely related to the coming-of-age ritual themes of "death" and "resurrection." The weeping farewell here cannot be understood as a farewell in the ordinary sense. On the surface, it is a farewell to companions, brothers, sisters, ancestors, parents, fellow villagers, and the hometown; on a deeper level, it is a farewell to one's own era as a maiden. Therefore, this is not a "farewell in life" but a "farewell in death," because the golden age of being a maiden can never return. Marriage marks the "death" of a carefree, unrestrained, youthful and lively maiden. The process of marriage is the process of this "death," and this can also be seen from some residual marriage customs of the Han and other ethnic minorities. For example, in Wuming, Guangxi, there was once a custom of a bride's family pasting white couplets on the door, indicating that the family had a "funeral." In some places in Jiangxi, the gongs and drums for a wedding are beaten weakly, as if for a funeral. The Tujia wedding song clearly states that marriage is "death." The song goes: "Leaped into the pit of the dead," "Stepped into the city of unjust death." Of course, the death mentioned in the lyrics does not refer to the actual "extinction" of the body, but is mostly a metaphor for the miserable situation of the woman after going to her husband's family. Yet from this we can also feel the fear of "death" that the woman experiences deep in her psyche. Its effect can be mentioned in the same breath as the "feigned death" of the coming-of-age ritual. The "resurrection" of the weeping bride is the cessation of crying; generally, when the bridal sedan chair is carried to a place where the groom's family can hear the crying, the crying must stop. When the woman enters the groom's home and faces a joyful scene utterly different from the sorrowful atmosphere of her natal family, she turns from sorrow to joy, breaks into a smile through tears, and is freed from the pain of "death," becoming a member of the new family. The "resurrected" woman has completed the important transition of her life stage, ending her innocent and romantic maidenhood and becoming a woman who follows the rules. In some places, certain rituals are held for the woman's "resurrection." For example, in the marriage customs of the Shui people, when the bride is about to reach the entrance of the groom's village, all the groom's family members and guests retreat outside the house, leaving the main door ajar, and welcome the bride with an empty room. Outside the main door are placed firewood, bamboo baskets, or sickles. When the bride enters the house, she must grab the items outside the door and bring them in. Inside the doorway, three bamboo strips are bent into arcs to block the way; the bride steps over them, symbolizing crossing three barriers. When the bride is about to step over, the groom's mother's side must each spit a mouthful of water at the bride, or brush the bride's body with a bundle of thatch to remove evil qi, as if the bride were truly emerging from hell. The Yao people have a similar custom: the groom's elders spray clear water on the bride who is about to enter the door, to ward off evil and drive away demons. These rituals are undoubtedly "resurrection" rituals in both form and spirit. When the bridal sedan chair of the Tujia bride is carried to the groom's doorstep, the groom's family invites a Tujia ritual master to perform rites to honor the gods and cut off evil, removing the bride's ill fortune. The ritual master places a pig's head on the altar table, inserts a pig-killing knife, burns incense and paper, and pours three cups of wine. When the bride descends from the sedan and enters the door, she is smoked in front, called "burning the four eyes." The significance of "burning the four eyes" is to eliminate the bride's evil qi. This is also a ritual that the bride must pass through in transforming from maiden to woman, having the meaning of "resurrecting" the new person.
The fourth characteristic is continuity in time. A truly mature weeping-marriage ritual cannot be completed in a few hours; it generally lasts several days to several months. Tujia weeping brides generally weep for 7 to 12 days, and some even as long as one or two months. Such a long period of weeping is by no means without reason; it embodies the coming-of-age ritual significance of a woman, after a period of transition, moving from one social status to another. Because only with sufficient time as a guarantee can a woman truly bid farewell to the past and move toward the future both psychologically and physiologically. According to the views of some anthropologists, the time of the coming-of-age ritual can be traced back to the training stage in preparation for the ritual. Among the Tujia, girls as young as twelve or thirteen already follow adult women in learning to weep-sing in babbling tones. In other words, from their youth, Tujia girls begin regular training to pass the "examination" of the coming-of-age ritual. Interestingly, Tujia elders regard girls learning to weep-marry as learning a craft, which shows that weeping-marriage is a "technique" that a woman must master when coming of age. However, the function of this "technique" is no longer in the technique itself, but in that through learning and mastering this "technique," the girl can taste the bitterness and hardship of an adult woman's life. And this is precisely the inherent meaning of the coming-of-age ritual, and also the reason why the Tujia weeping-marriage custom must last a relatively long time.
In summary, we believe that the weeping-marriage custom previews for the marrying woman the course of her married life, causing her, in the process of "death" and "resurrection," to accept various painful trials and the admonitions of her elders, thereby completing the transition from a carefree maiden to a woman who can endure humiliation and bear heavy burdens. The marrying woman thenceforth possesses certain qualities of an adult woman. The weeping-marriage custom has very obvious coming-of-age ritual significance.
III. Reasons Why the Weeping-Marriage Custom Incorporates Coming-of-Age Ritual Significance
The Tujia custom of crying marriage was originally part of the wedding ceremony. Why does it also bear the characteristics of a coming-of-age rite? According to the Changyang County Gazetteer: "In ancient times, capping and marriage were two separate matters, but in Changyang they are combined into one. One or two days before the marriage, the bride's family comes to arrange her hair and pin it up, which is called 'shangtou' (putting up the hair). A banquet is set to toast the girl, and nine young girls are invited; together with the bride they make ten, which is called 'accompanying the ten sisters.'" In the course of its long development, the crying-marriage custom gradually incorporated the ritual forms of the coming-of-age ceremony. Although the incorporated coming-of-age ritual forms were given a new appearance and merged with the wedding ceremony, their inherent coming-of-age connotations did not disappear on that account. The coming-of-age ritual forms incorporated into the Tujia crying-marriage wedding ceremony are mainly of three kinds: the first and second are the "shangtou" and "kailian" (face-threading) rituals. These two rituals were originally coming-of-age ceremonies for girls widely popular among the Han and many other ethnic minorities. They were included in the Tujia crying-marriage procedure, performed on the night before the girl's marriage, and accompanied by the girl's crying songs. The holding of the two rituals marked the end of the girl's maidenhood and the beginning of her life as an adult woman. The girl's crying songs made the meaning of this transition from old to new even more prominent, thereby strengthening the girl's own sense of adulthood, and this strengthening of consciousness was achieved through the stimulus of pain. Consider two crying-marriage songs. "Crying Over Face-Threading": "If you pull out one eyebrow hair, little sister becomes ten times more lowly from now on. If you pull the eyebrows neat, I must part from my brothers and sisters-in-law... The eyebrows are pulled and the face is threaded, and nine out of ten who see me will despise me." "Crying Over Hair-Combing": "With braids hanging down I am a person of honor; with hair combed into a bun I am a lowly person. Pick up the mirror and take a look—I am no longer like my companions. My aunt, how could you be so cruel... The days of shedding tears have come, the days of washing my face with tears have come, the days of crossing the river with tears have come, the days of soaking rice in tears have come." The form of the coming-of-age ceremony, combined with the content of the crying-marriage songs, makes this form of life transition unforgettable for a lifetime. The third ritual is "accompanying the ten sisters," which also evolved from a coming-of-age ceremony; its prototype is the girls' coming-of-age ceremony "Shalage," which was still passed down among the Yi people until recent times. This ritual is held at the girl's home and presided over by a group of close female companions aged 15 to 17. Elders and outsiders, regardless of sex, are all forbidden to attend. In the ritual, the girl receiving the coming-of-age ceremony appears in the identity of a "bride," with the clothes and jewelry her mother prepared for her placed beside her. When the ritual begins, the sisters dress the girl up as a beautiful bride. The leading girl first sings: "When the goat sees the luohe vine, it must eat even if it does not want to; when the phoenix spreads its golden wings, it must fly even if it does not want to. The Amu Moqu Moji (dowry) is ready; she must go even if she does not want to." A mischievous girl then teases the pretend bride, asking her: "Is that so?" "Is that so?" The pretend bride does not answer, but shyly lets herself be teased. A girl nearby always answers for her: "Yes," "That is so." Next, similar songs are sung in turn and similar teasing and responses are made, and the gathering disperses only when everyone is fully satisfied. "Shalage," in the form of jesting and laughter, dispels the newly matured girl's fear and unfamiliarity toward marriage and gives her psychological preparation for her future marriage. In this way, when marriage arrives, she does not feel it too sudden, nor is she panicked by fear. A girl who has received "Shalage" from then on enjoys adult rights (including the right to marry). "Shalage" and "accompanying the ten sisters" have basically the same organizational form and both contain content urging marriage; thus it can be seen that there is a relationship of common origin or derivation between the two. Of course, compared with "Shalage," "accompanying the ten sisters" has undergone great development and change. First, laughing songs were changed to crying songs; second, content of sorrow at parting and resentment toward marriage was added; third, the number of participants in the ritual was fixed at ten; fourth, the time was extended from one night to several nights or even longer. These changes not only did not weaken its coming-of-age significance, but strengthened it.
The second reason is that it resulted from the evolution and degeneration of the coming-of-age ceremony. With the development of human society, the primitive, savage, and cruel coming-of-age ceremonies gradually degenerated and disappeared, and the function of the coming-of-age ceremony was taken over by modern human education. In the history of China's various ethnic groups, there were also many kinds of relatively ancient coming-of-age rituals. For example, the Yao people once had the "Dujie" ritual. In the ritual, the young man receiving the coming-of-age ceremony rolled down from a high platform more than one zhang tall and landed on a large vine-and-bamboo net held by several people, which was called "turning over the cloud terrace." In some Yao areas, besides turning over the cloud terrace, there were also procedures such as climbing a knife ladder (climbing barefoot up a ladder with sharp blades), stepping on fire bricks (stepping barefoot on heated bricks), and fishing from a hot pot (reaching into boiling oil to retrieve objects). At night, the ritual master transmitted religious rites and lessons, such as reciting religious classics and the history of the ethnic group and clan. Tattooing was also once a coming-of-age ritual, popular among the Dai, Jino, Wa, Zhuang, Gaoshan, Li, and other ethnic groups. Many similar rituals could also be cited. In short, in China's history there were relatively harsh and primitive coming-of-age rituals; later, these rituals either disappeared on their own, were prohibited, or were transformed into recreational and athletic competitions. With the gradual disappearance of coming-of-age ceremonies, modern education became extremely important for adolescents in the transitional period. However, before Liberation, due to political, economic, and other reasons, in some ethnic minority areas there was no implementation of modern education at all, while the traditional coming-of-age ceremony had already disappeared. Therefore, the function of providing life education to adolescents and helping them complete life's transition was partly or wholly transferred to the wedding ceremony—the only existing life ritual that could not be abolished.
The third reason lies in marriage customs and institutions. In China's old marriage customs, the age at which women married was on the young side, generally between 12 and 16. For example, in the Western Han dynasty, "women who were fifteen or older and up to thirty and did not marry were taxed five suan"; five suan meant paying a poll tax five times that of ordinary people. The Song dynasty stipulated: "All men aged fifteen and women aged thirteen or above may marry." Among some remote ethnic minority areas in China, women married even younger, often being married off at around 12. The content of Tujia crying-marriage songs reflects this phenomenon of early marriage: "My hair has not yet taken root, my teeth have not yet fully grown, I do not even know how to weave hemp and spin yarn, and I cannot even carry a large back basket..." Marrying too early is extremely harmful. Wang Ji of the Western Han period once said: "In worldly custom, marriage is too early; before knowing the way of being parents they have children, and therefore education is unclear and many people die young." From the perspective of folklore, the marriage age of women in old times was precisely in the life-transition period of the coming-of-age ceremony, and chronologically it squeezed out the process of implementing the girls' coming-of-age ceremony, which was undoubtedly harmful to women's lives after marriage. As a remedial measure, the content of the coming-of-age ceremony was incorporated into the wedding ceremony.
Introducing elements of the coming-of-age ceremony into the wedding ritual exists not only in the crying-marriage custom, but also in other marriage customs. For example, in the Yugur marriage custom, when the bride approaches the large house (large tent) set up by the groom's family, two fires are lit by the roadside, and the bride must walk between them; at this time the groom shoots a soft arrow made of willow branches at the bride, and hitting her is considered auspicious, after which the arrow is thrown into the fire and burned. This process expresses the theme of "death" and "resurrection." The Jingpo people also have a similar marriage custom. On the wedding day, the groom's family erects five clumps of bangbang grass at the main gate and prepares a ladder. When the ritual is held, the Dumsa chants before the grass clumps and sacrifices to the household spirits; after chanting, livestock are killed for sacrifice, and the animal blood is splashed on the bangbang grass as a symbol of the spirits sharing the sacrifice. The bride must be led by her mother-in-law through the "bangbang grass" and up the new ladder into the house. According to legend, the ancestor of the Jingpo married a dragon girl as his wife, and to remove her fishy odor, this ritual was held. The outer shell of this myth and legend contains folkloric content, namely removing the dragon girl's fishy odor, marking the dragon girl's transformation into a human wife; its symbolic meaning lies in a woman's transition from maiden to adult. In the Hezhen wedding, after the couple enters the bridal chamber, an elderly person also presides over an admonition ritual for the bride. The admonisher holds three reeds tied together with three red cloths and instructs the bride, telling her to be filial to her parents-in-law, respect her husband, treat others kindly, and be diligent and thrifty in managing the household. This is clearly moving into the wedding ritual a ceremony that should have been held in the coming-of-age ceremony. For example, the Uyghur face-threading ritual is held when a woman's first child is forty days old; at that time, the mother, staying at her natal home, has the fine hair on her face plucked and her "bangs," the mark of a girl, along with many small braids, combed into two thick braids, indicating the difference between a maiden and a young married woman. The various examples above show that in the wedding ceremonies of some ethnic minorities in China, elements of the coming-of-age ceremony are often more or less included, which provides a cultural background for us to confirm the coming-of-age significance of the Tujia crying-marriage custom. The coming-of-age significance of the Tujia crying-marriage custom is by no means an isolated cultural phenomenon.