Cotton clothes down jacket has always been our usual wintering items, before there are people curious why our cotton is not used up, because China is a very large cotton country, and the famous Xinjiang cotton is more inexpensive, the quality is quite good, but this is a modern thing, so how did the ancient people spend the winter?
According to historical records, cotton began to spread during the Ming Dynasty, so how did people spend the winter before the Ming Dynasty? For example, in the Song Dynasty, although the Song Dynasty also had cotton planting, but the output was not large, it could not supply the whole country, so in the Song Dynasty people did not have quilts, only relying on wearing paper clothes and cover paper to be cold, why not be frozen? Let's take a look at it today.
First, the ancient people's heating methods
For how the ancient people warmed, everyone is still very curious, after all, the ancient material is lacking, and many things have not been invented, it is not easy to spend the winter safely, otherwise there would not be so many people who froze to death before, especially in the ancient people living in Harbin and other areas.
Before the Song Dynasty, when people had not yet mastered the cotton planting technology, most of the ancient people were warming in winter through roasting fire, in addition to roasting fire, there were many layers of heavy linen clothes, etc. At that time, there was no cotton, no down, only two sets of linen clothes, which could also have some warm effect.
If it is the aristocratic class, they use more things, they can use charcoal with more precious things to roast the fire, and the amount they can use is much more than that of ordinary people, and the nobles wear silk clothes, so the people of the aristocratic class have to live much easier in winter than the common people.
And later, people invented a kind of winter artifact, that is, the earth kang that is still in use today, this thing is particularly popular in the northeast, in fact, to put it bluntly, the house is made into a mezzanine, and then made a fire to heat, this invention is very popular among ordinary people, generally as long as the family has the conditions will be such a kang, so that they can survive the winter.
Second, the royal family's wintering method
Everyone knows that China's feudal imperial system has lasted for more than 2,000 years, and the conditions in the ancient royal family must be the best, so the way the harem ladies spend the winter is also relatively high-end, and they can use a lot of materials, which can be seen in the TV series, and the most common occurrence in China's costume dramas is the TV series of the Qing Dynasty.
And these dramas have appeared many times in the harem concubine heating method, such as the very classic "Zhen Huan Biography", in the winter, those concubines will hold a small heater in their hands, this is one of their heating methods, and the heater material used by the harem ladies is the best, the heat preservation effect is also very good, and there are special replacements, always uninterrupted hot water.
Therefore, their winter is actually not too uncomfortable, such a thing has actually been passed down to today, there are still very retro hand stoves, and the evolved hand warmer is the current warm baby, in addition to the hand stove, there is also a winter artifact is the brazier smoker, which is also reflected in the TV series.
Generally, the harem concubines' palace will place one or two pots of brazier smokers, and the carbon they use is also the best, the carbon is also uninterrupted at all times, and there are special replacements, it is precisely because the conditions of these harem ladies are very good, so there will be so many people desperately trying to climb to the position of the niangniang, and these material distribution is also one of the sources of the harem's favor.
Because the carbon stored in the palace is not endless, it is natural to be distributed to the most favored people, and the low-ranking concubines certainly do not have such good conditions, and in addition to these, there is also a pepper room hall, there are many sayings about the pepper room hall, and the most common saying that has been handed down is that the pepper room hall is actually a thermal insulation room.
But in ancient times, its greater value than the insulation room is a kind of glory, is to represent the emperor's exclusive favor for a concubine, "Pepper Room Hall" as the name suggests is to chop the peppercorns, grind them into powder and paint them on the wall, forming a special insulation layer, and then hanging blankets on the outside, using animal feathers as a curtain, and laying another carpet on the ground.
Under such an all-round encirclement, it is difficult to think of warmth, so only extremely favored concubines have such treatment, and the frequency of the pepper room hall since ancient times is not very high, because even the royal family cannot afford the cost of many pepper room halls.
All in all, the harem's mother-in-law life is certainly much better than that of ordinary people, and it is easy to spend the winter comfortably, but when cotton is not fully prevalent, they can only rely on surgery and clothes for warmth.
Third, the heating method of the Song Dynasty
The above said a lot of ways of heating, but these are more conventional, next to tell you a more special way of heating, that is, the Northern Song Dynasty paper fur, in that era the yield of cotton is very low, and the price is expensive, spread to the mainland, so cotton is not very popular, many people do not know whether there is cotton this thing.
Even if you know that you don't have so much money to buy, what do you do? You can't wait to die in the winter, can you? So people came up with another way, that is, to use paper to make warm clothes, the paper mentioned here is not the same as the paper we usually understand, the paper we commonly see now is writing paper and wrapping paper and toilet paper and so on.
These papers are very thin, is not a little heating effect, and the Song Dynasty paper is not this kind of thin paper, but a special material made, after all, the ancients are not so stupid, if you really take the writing paper to heat, it is no different from no clothes, the paper they made, in fact, is also made of resin.
It is the resin of the tree, which is very hard to touch, but this is a warm effect, so it can resist the cold in winter, and add some special materials to these papers to make clothes, and because of its raw materials, people have given it a name, called paper fur.
The practical effect of paper fur is very good, the key is that its price is very cheap, can be passed out, so that more people use, so paper fur in the Song Dynasty is extremely popular, the general people's home is not difficult to buy.
In the works of the Song Dynasty literati who have been handed down now, there are also many mentions of paper fur, and the invention of paper fur was still of great help to the Song Dynasty at that time, after all, when cotton was not popular, the emergence of paper fur allowed a large part of people to save their lives in winter.
4. Summary
Later, with the increase of cotton production and the introduction of more external materials, paper fur will gradually disappear in history, our current life is very convenient, the rapid development of science and technology, winter has long been no longer a problem, in addition to cotton clothes, cotton jackets, we also have a variety of high-tech facilities, such as air conditioning, heating and so on.
This makes us very comfortable in winter, but many of our winter measures are imitated by the ancients, but we have improved the methods of the ancients to make it more convenient and more suitable for people to survive.
From these wintering measures, we can see the wisdom of the ancients in that era, the more difficult the environment, the more able to stimulate some creative inspiration, and the spirit of innovation of the ancients, the spirit of continuous trial and error, is also worth learning.