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1、The Marriage System and Womans Position in Ancient ChinaThe marriage system in ancient China is an important issue of Chinese ancient culture history research. The ethics in Chinese feudal society thinks: faint (marriage), is the basis of etiquette,” considering that marriage as the beginning of int
2、erpersonal relationship. It is because marriage occupies an important position so called marriage affair or “lifetime affair”. In ancient China，the marriage system was monogamy. Even the emperor also just had one wife, at that time, as long as it was under certain conditions(mainly sufficient materi
3、a and high status), anyone could marry a lot of “wives”, but they were called concubines and could not say his wife. As was similar to the common people.Concerning the etiquette of ancient marriage, the process could said to be quite complicated and troublesome. Compared with “naked marriage”the mos
4、t fashionable and convenient type of marriage nowadays, in my opinion, ancient marriage was a headache stuff. The whole process mainly included six procedures, that is, 纳采na cai meant if a man wanted to marry a girl, he would send a matchmaker to propose a marriage, if the girl permitted, then the m
5、an would send some gifts; 问名wen ming meant the man sent the matchmaker to ask the girls name and her birthday to cast a horoscope; 纳吉na ji meant if the horoscope was well-matched, then the matchmaker would inform the news to the girl, and sent her gifts as engagement; 纳征na zheng meant the man side w
6、ould send betrothal gift the girl side; 请期qing qi meant the man side would send someone to inform the girl side the day that they would get married; 亲迎qin ying meant the man went to the girls home to marry his bride on his own.Among the six procedures, wild goose was considered the most important gi
7、ft. 礼曰：女子十五许嫁，纳采、问名、纳吉、请期、亲迎，以雁为贽。纳征用玄熏，故不用雁也。 Why wild goose in ancient China was so important? First, wild goose was a kind of migratory birds, whenever north to south or south to north, they would obey the rule, never break the promiss. It symbolize the mutual faith after marriage, husband and wi
8、fes undying devotion; second, wild goose was the bird along with Yang, explained the woman married would follow her husband; third, the wild geese behaved orderly both when flying and motionless, which symbolized the woman married must respect for seniority, which was not insurmountable. Obviously,
9、we can see that within the whole process of marriage, woman has no initiative. The only thing she could do was to stay at home and wait the man to marry her.“父母之命，媒妁之言”The order of the parents and the words of matchmaker was all she needed to listen to.The womans social position was quite low in tha
10、t paternal society. For example, “婚(昏)hn (wedding, marriage)” means that the bachelor kidnaps a girl, bringing her to dusk wedding; “娶q (marry a woman, wive)” means that the bachelor buys his bride with some betrothal gifts; “嫁ji (marry a man)” means that a gril leaves the parents to husbands family
11、 after wedding, often losing personal liberty; “妾qi (concubine)” means that a woman contracted to a man as a secondary wife, often having few legal rights and low social status, and so on.After marriage, the woman must obey the three cardinal guides and the five constant virtues, whatever she said a
12、nd whatever she did would center with her husband. Their duties were to stay at home and take good care of the big family and gave birth to sons to pass the generation on. If the woman didnt have a son, her position in the family would even be worse. Sometimes she would be abused by the the father-i
13、n-law and mother-in law, and even by her husband. This was another reflection of the idea that women were inferior to men.Untill now, women in the society are still sometimes looked down, just because they dont give birth to a son. But in general, the womans position have raised a lot. Of course, the marriage system has also improved a lot.
