At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the costume system had not yet been perfected, and it was not surprising that the portrait of Chang Yuchun wore a dragon robe with a five-clawed dragon pattern.
Rong Ma's lifelong meritorious deeds, by Zhu Yuanzhang's other eyes, born in Huaiyuan County, Fengyang Province, Chang Yuchun, can also be regarded as Zhu Yuanzhang's hometown, initially Chang Yuchun and Dingyuan area as thieves, and later followed Zhu Yuanzhang passing by on the way to the army, at first, Zhu Yuanzhang did not pay too much attention to this person who defected to himself halfway, but the Battle of Quarry Rock, often encountered the Spring War and became famous for its first appearance.
Because of his bravery in battle, Chang Yuchun was also known as "Chang 100,000", and Zhu Yuanzhang praised him as "although a famous general in ancient times, he has never had it".
More important than his invincibility on the battlefield, Chang Yuchun was loyal to Zhu Yuanzhang, so he was valued by Zhu Yuanzhang, and Chang Yuchun's eldest daughter was pointed out by Zhu Yuanzhang to his most beloved eldest son Zhu Biao, and the two became in-laws.
On the seventh day of July in the second year of Ming Hongwu's reign, Chang Yuchun returned from the Kaiping class to the south, and as a result, he marched to Liuhechuan and died of illness, only forty years old. Zhu Yuanzhang was overwhelmed with grief when he heard the bad news.
Zhu Yuanzhang's edict: Wang Ti three-foot sword, ride on the wind and clouds, four marches and the world, pioneering merits, meet the spring residence seven eight.
After Chang Yuchun's death, he was buried at Zhongshan, and Zhu Yuanzhang personally made him a memorial, and posthumously honored him as a meritorious servant of Yiyuan Tuicheng Xuande Jingyuan, Kaifu Yi Tongsansi, Taibao, Shangzhu Guo, Zhongshu Right Chancellor, posthumously titled Kaiping Wang, with the title of "Zhongwu", and worthy of the Taimiao Temple.
After that, Zhu Yuanzhang ordered court painters to paint a full-body portrait of the dragon robe for him.
The portrait of chang yuchun's dragon robe is indeed a real handiwork, and it is reasonable to say that Chang Yuchun has made great contributions, and the relationship between him and Zhu Yuanzhang is also very close, and it is not a problem to be treated so favorably, but what makes posterity strange is that Zhu Yuanzhang let people paint a portrait of Chang Yuchun, dressed in dragon robes.
No matter how high the merit of the courtiers, wearing a dragon robe is really counterintuitive, so there is also speculation that the portrait of the dragon robe of Changyu Spring is an imitation and not a genuine painting, so it is wrong to draw it wrong, however, the existing portrait of changyu spring dragon robe is indeed genuine.
According to the relevant historical records of the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang ordered the painter to paint a portrait for Chang Yuchun, hanging in the Temple of Meritorious Heroes, second only to Xu Da, and after the funeral, the Chang Yuchun family asked Taizu to make another painting for the memorial, Taizu agreed, and the painter copied another one, which was treasured by the Chang family.
Jianwen four years of Jing difficult changes, Changsheng died in battle Jinchuanmen, Changsheng's wife Hu Shi, the portrait of Chang Yuchun, brought to Lin'anwei, Yunnan, after more than 80 years, Hongzhi Dynasty, Qifu Chang, Deng, Li, Tang four descendants of the descendants, at that time, chang descendants often returned to the portrait of Gao's grandparents.
After that, the portrait fell into the hands of Chang Yanling, the Marquis of Huaiyuan at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and during the Qing Dynasty, Chang Yanling cut his hair and became a monk, taking away the family tree and portrait, until the eleventh year of Shunzhi, Chang Yanling handed the portrait to Chang Yanling, a descendant of the Chang clan.
This portrait has also been preserved to this day, exactly the same as the portrait of Chang Yuchun treasured in the imperial palace, and after many appraisals and examinations, it has been confirmed that it was painted by the court painters of the early Ming Dynasty.
In fact, the portrait of the dragon robe that often met the spring, at that time, there was no problem that the portrait of the dragon robe painted by Zhu Yuanzhang for Chang Yuchun survived to this day, and the portrait of Chang Yuchun was actually wearing a dragon robe.
Ancient emperors, calling themselves true dragon Tianzi, wore a royal dress called dragon robe, also known as dragon Yan, the five-clawed golden dragon picture embroidered on it was for the exclusive use of the emperor, and others were not allowed to trespass, although there was a python robe similar to it, but the embroidery was only four claws to show the difference. However, the dragon robe passed down by Chang Yuchun is indeed embroidered with a five-clawed golden dragon.
Why did Chang Yuchun wear a dragon robe? In fact, it was not that Zhu Yuanzhang was too sad to make a mistake at that time, but a cognitive error of people today.
In fact, before the Yuan Dynasty, the emperor's clothing, except for the yanfu worn on extremely formal occasions, almost did not embroider various gorgeous patterns directly onto the clothes.
Whether it is the Sui and Tang dynasties or the two Song Dynasties, the imperial costumes are often high-grade and pure, and the texture is simple, until the painting style of the Yuan Dynasty suddenly changes, from the emperor to the nobility, down to the ordinary luxury, and the patterns on the clothing suddenly become gorgeous.
During the Yuan Dynasty, dragons, phoenixes and the like were not special patterns for emperors, except for prominent people, even ordinary people with solid families would embroider dragon patterns on their clothes. The use of ornate costumes such as embroidered dragons as symbols of power is now considered by many people to be a tradition "since ancient times", but in fact, this tradition began to appear in the Yuan Dynasty.
Yuan Dynasty "Tongtiao Grid System": The first year of Dade, the prohibition: Zhongshu Provincial Music, the strips sold in the street market, like the royal dragon worn by the upper rank, then one less claw, four claws woven and sold... It seems that every time we wear a strip weaving wrapped around the dragon, the end is said at the root, everywhere the document prohibition covenant, suspend the weaver.
In other words, during the Yuan Dynasty, the folk generally used dragon patterns, but the embroidered dragons are four-clawed, and the five-clawed entangled dragon, etc., the folk are not allowed to use, at that time there was no so-called "python dragon" title, until the late Yuan Dynasty, it gradually began to appear "python dragon" title, saying that it is a four-clawed dragon.
At the same time, the five-clawed dragon is still not a special pattern for emperors.
The outermost layer of the crown excavated from the tomb of Li Yu in Zoucheng, Shandong Province, is a short-sleeved diamond pattern of the jacket protection, and under the protection, it is a five-clawed dragon pattern sticker, and Li Yu's identity before his death is only the Confucian teachings of Zoucheng in the Yuan Dynasty.
Li Chao's "Pu Tongshi" records: Here the big red embroidered five-clawed python dragon, the warp and weft threads are woven, and the upper part is used, and he cannot buy him without twelve or two pieces of silver.
Although the five-clawed golden dragon was a "pattern for use" at that time, it was still widely popular in the folk, and it was different from the pattern used by the royal family nobles, and it could even be bought and sold, but the price was relatively expensive.
In the early days of the Ming Dynasty, most of the systems inherited the Yuan Dynasty, although the Ming Dynasty uniform system was said to restore the old system of the Han, Tang and Song Dynasties, but it also absorbed a large number of Yuan Dynasty styles.
At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the imperial court uniform system was still relatively chaotic and general, and it was not until the twenty-fourth year of Hongwu that the rules of the style of the civil and military officials were officially promulgated, in which the python robe was used exclusively by the kings or as an honor for the elders of the heavy subjects.
When Zhu Yuanzhang ordered the portrait of Chang Yuchun, the various costumes of the Ming Dynasty were still not perfect, and during the Yuan Dynasty, the use of the five-clawed golden dragon was a common phenomenon, and the dragon robe worn in the portrait of Chang Yuchun was indeed a dragon robe, because at that time, the title of "python robe" was still just a common name of the folk, used to distinguish between the four-clawed dragon robe and the five-clawed dragon robe.
To put it bluntly, Chang Yuchun had the opportunity to use the costume of the five-clawed golden dragon, which was just a special case in the early Ming Dynasty.
In addition, there is a saying that after Chang Yuchun's death, Zhu Yuanzhang took off the dragon robe in grief and covered Chang Yuchun's body as a shou robe, and the painter painted the dragon robe together when he drew the portrait, but there was no official record of such a statement, so there was no way to talk about it.