What is the story of Cowherd and Weaver Girl in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties?

By the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the story of Cowherd and Weaver Girl had almost matured. The Chronicle of Jingchu by Liang Zonggu in Southern Dynasties;

In the east of Tianhe, there is a weaver girl and the daughter of the Emperor of Heaven. Weave hard work year after year to make a brocade dress. God pitied him for being alone and promised to marry a cowherd in Hexi. After marriage, he gave up knitting. The Emperor of Heaven was furious and ordered him to return to Hedong. He only crossed the river for a period of time on the night of July 7th every year.

Heaven and earth seem to be a strict parent, which is probably a reflection of family life and ethical norms during the Han and Wei Dynasties.

China literature is characterized by poetry, and the spread of early myths and legends is also dominated by poetry. Poets and poets lamented the yearning for acacia, the sadness when they met, and the melancholy after parting. The advantage of poetry is that it can be infinitely romantic, but it is difficult to have substantive content. Therefore, in a long historical period, this legendary plot has not made much progress.

Later, with the prosperity of stories and story-based dramas, The Legend of Petunia and the Weaver Girl really opened up the story-telling posture, including the background, time, place, characters, the ins and outs of events and so on. Clear eyes and clear details.

The wife of Dong Yong, the first volume of Gan Bao's Searching for the Gods, is the earliest version of this folk popular story, and it is also the blueprint of the "fairy couple" later. Yong Dong's filial piety touched heaven, and the emperor sent the Weaver Maid to marry him and help him pay his debts.

Another article, The Sweater Woman, tells the story of a feathered fairy who came down to earth and married a man in Xinyu County, Zhang Yu.

Later, the immortal couple may have combined the ancient legends of Petunia and Weaver Girl, and finally formed a story that we are familiar with.

During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the story of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl began to merge with the custom of Qixi, which became a common festival with increasingly rich activities. Liang Zonggu's Chronicle of Jingchu in the Southern Dynasties records:

On July 7, it was the night when Penny and Weaver got together ... At night, women wore colorful ribbons, seven-hole needles or gold and silver needles, and Chen Guaguo was trying to be clever in court. If you have a happy subnet on melon, you think it corresponds.

This fully embodies the scene of folk women wearing needles and paying homage to the stars on Tanabata. This is also a way that women often use to infer their talent in embroidery by observing spiders' webs.

The practice of the Southern Dynasties was to put a spider on the melon, let it form a spider web on the melon, and then guess whether it is smart according to the density of the spider web, because the legend of the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl attached to it is widely circulated. During this period, the original taboo meaning of Tanabata has completely disappeared at this time, and the seventh day of the seventh lunar month has become an auspicious day to appreciate the gathering of heaven and beg for human happiness.

Therefore, Valentine's Day in China in this period not only inherited and developed the existing custom of begging for cleverness, but also increased the customs of begging for money, begging for longevity and begging for children.

At the same time, Tanabata became people's emotional support because of people's yearning and pursuit for the faithful love of Cowherd and Weaver Girl. The custom of hanging clothes upstairs in Han Dynasty evolved into the custom of hanging books in Wei and Jin Dynasties.

Shi Shuo Xin Yu records:

On July 7th, Long Hao saw all his neighbors drying clothes. Long Naiyang is lying on his back, and the clouds are "drying books".

In addition, Mr Ruan Xian saw his neighbors drying clothes on Tanabata, but their coarse rags were also hung on the wall of his house. This shows that the Qixi custom has a great influence on people.

Among them, courtship and courtship are closely related to women's life and spirit, and the importance attached to children in feudal society directly determines women's status, so courtship was also an important activity of women at that time, and courtship was an unattainable wish of feudal women.