Mrs. Republic of China in the film and television drama
Dressed in a cheongsam, he competed for glory, drank tea every day, and listened to music. This is the description of the image of the aunt in many film and television dramas during the Republic of China, and even many people want to return to the Republic of China to be the aunt of the warlord. So what was the real life of the aunt during the Republic of China period?
After the Xinhai Revolution, the country entered a period of alternating between the old and the new, and before that, the military command in various localities was in the hands of local forces. This led to the warlords' local divisions. Among them, the three most important forces were warlords of the direct lineage headed by Feng Guozhang, Cao Kun, and Wu Peifu, the Warlords of the Anhui Clan headed by Duan Qirui, and the warlords of the Feng clan headed by Zhang Zuolin, a henchman of Yuan Shikai' henchman Zhang Xiluan. The warlords of the Zhi, Anhui, and Feng dynasties are the three relatively strong forces in the chaos of the Republic of China. Other local warlord forces such as the Jin, Dian, and Guangdong clans are also there.
Warlords of various departments in the Republic of China
During the Republic of China period, monogamy was practiced, but concubinage was not explicitly prohibited. The number of warlords in various places is large, and the number of aunts and wives is also difficult to count. But most warlords will have 3 or 4 few, and the number of more will not be fixed. Like Zhang Zongchang, there are dozens of rumors (some say 23, some say more than 40), and the Sichuan army general Fan Shaozeng has many rumors, and even says that his aunt and wife are as many as forty. Some people once wrote a "Biography of seventeen aunts" based on him, which was popular for a while.
There are many aunts and wives, but except for the eldest aunt who is the right wife and needs to be married, the others are essentially concubines. Once the concubine is established, she has no relationship with the mother's family, it is a kind of contract relationship, the husband's family can be driven away at any time, and there is no guarantee of rights. Most of the aunts and wives came from poor backgrounds, and many were forced to become aunts.
Aunt Snow
The status of a concubine has been low since its existence. In the current film and television dramas, some aunts and wives dress up very charmingly, rely on the love of their husbands, and fight with their wives. Aunt Xue in "Love Is Deep in the Rain" became popular because of her spicy and mean image. But this kind of film and television drama, in real life, is rare. Concubines need to obey the instructions of the right wife, and even the right wife can scold and punish the concubine at will. Under the double yoke of the husband and the wife, the life of a concubine is very difficult.
Yuan Shikai's third aunt, TaiJin, revealed before her death that she had been tied up by her great aunt and beaten until one leg fell disabled and could not bend until she died. The third aunt was a relative of Princess Lee of Joseon and was also the daughter of an aristocrat. She is like this, let alone anything else. One of the warlord Yang Sen's concubines, Cai Wenna, said bluntly: "Concubines are nothing more than raising a pig at home, anyway, some are money." Warlords are not short of money nor women, and many aunts and wives just accept them on a whim.
In "A Family in a Transitional Era", Cai Wenna revealed one of Yang Sen's concubines, who entered Nankai University to study (Yang Sen likes intellectual women, so he will send his wife and concubine to school), idly traveling to Pingjin, Shanghai and Han, and other places, so someone secretly reported to Yang Sen that "his life was romantic and his behavior was improper", and Yang Sen "recalled him and finally shot him.". Cai Wenna herself is said to have fallen in love with her classmates during school and went to France on an appointment, but was later discovered by Janssen and shot.
The status of the aunt as a concubine is very low, and there are no human rights and freedoms. Some warlords will give their aunts to their subordinates after they are tired. The real abolition of the aunt and wife will not be until after 1949, when the founding of the new China enabled women to finally get rid of the status of the most male vassal.
Chinese women