In ancient China, due to backward social development and conservative thinking, most women were labeled as "women's talentlessness is virtue", so that many girls could not be educated when they were young, and could only learn female red at home, or follow their mothers to learn the rules of husbands and children, and were married off at eleven, twenty-three.
There are also many famous cases of emperors marrying concubines in history, and most of them are eleven-two-three flower season girls. For example, when Emperor Hui of Han was 11 years old and forced by Empress Lü, Emperor Hui of Han made her empress; Empress Dugu during the Sui Dynasty married Yang Jian at the age of 14, while during the Tang Dynasty, Li Shimin married her eldest grandson at the age of 13. There are still many such young girls who have families at the age of thirteen or fourteen, and even during the Tang Dynasty, the state introduced a stipulation that "women must marry at the age of 14".
So why did ancient men, especially emperors, always like to marry thirteen or fourteen-year-old girls in the flower season? Is it because ancient times themselves started their families early, or because there are other deep meanings?
Some examples of royal families listed above are only the tip of the iceberg, in fact, not only the emperor, even if the common people marry wives, they are thirteen or fourteen-year-old girls, but in today's society, marrying a thirteen-four-year-old girl is a violation of social laws and a crime, in ancient times, why did it become a normal phenomenon? There are a number of reasons for this.
First, social unrest, demographic factors. In China's 5,000-year history, it has experienced more than a dozen dynasties and iterations, each of which has been accompanied by war, munitions, and tens of thousands of deaths and injuries. In ancient times, the medical level was backward, and the technology was also very backward, the population mortality rate itself was very high, coupled with the low birth rate, the population was originally small, not to mention that in ancient times often experienced wars, each war meant a sharp decline in population.
In order to ensure the population, ancient people formed the habit of marrying early. Secondly, the average life expectancy of the ancients was short, unlike the medical equipment brought about by today's technological progress, which can ensure that the average life expectancy of people is about seventy years old. During the most chaotic periods, the average life expectancy of people was not even twenty years, and the average life expectancy of ancient emperors was only about forty years. Backward medical care, social instability, hardship in people's lives and other social and environmental factors are all reasons for early marriage in ancient times.
Second, the fancy years are fleeting. For ancient women, youth is very important, generally thirteen or fourteen years old is the most beautiful moment in a woman's life, at this time they are full of vigor, youthful flowers, and it is such a beautiful age is the main reason why ancient emperors like it.
Throughout the Chinese emperors, most of them married thirteen or fourteen-year-old concubines, such little girls were sent to the palace, they have not yet grown up, their personalities and ideas are still forming, and it is easiest for the emperor to train them to be what he likes.
Not only that, if these women who were accepted into the palace were trained according to the standards, it would be easier to control and discipline them, and it would be easier for them to better serve the emperor in the future. As we all know, the emperor is the supreme being, sitting on the seat of the Supreme of the Ninth Five, and all the treatment he enjoys is very exquisite, and he must be carefully selected, and he must also undergo strict examination.
The women selected in ancient times are such a batch of beautiful jade that has been carefully selected and has to be carefully "polished". As we all know, the ancient draft process is very complicated, first of all, you have to meet the age conditions, that is, between thirteen and sixteen years old, and secondly, you have to meet the appearance conditions, you have to look good, you have to look good, you can't crooked dates, and even there are clear requirements for body shape. As mentioned earlier, Emperor Han Hui appointed 11-year-old Zhang Yan as empress, which was just a despicable means used by Empress Lü to consolidate her power, and most of the ancient emperors' daughters were thirteen or fourteen years old.
Third, consolidate imperial power and manage government at an early date. In ancient China, many emperors were "puppet emperors" supported by the empress dowager or courtiers, and these emperors were forced to ascend the throne at a young age, but only in the name of an emperor, sitting on the dragon chair of the court, and a teenager who understood what imperial politics was behind the moves.
And sometimes, in order to further consolidate their power, those who hold real power will marry their daughters who are related to or have interests to the emperor. The most well-known cases are Empress Dowager Lü and Emperor Hui of Han. At that time, Empress Dowager Lü grasped the imperial government, and for a time became powerful, supporting the puppet emperor, Emperor Hanhui, to ascend the throne. In order to consolidate her power, Empress Dowager Lü even married Emperor Hanhui's youngest niece, Zhang Yan, who was only 11 years old, to him as empress. Such a contrary thing is only to satisfy its purpose of consolidating its power, which can be imagined as the sadness and deplorability of the ancient royal family.
And there is another situation, that is, after the emperor reigns for a long time, he slowly understands things and knows right from wrong, such an emperor in the saying is "wings hard", and when the emperor understands that he is in the supreme position, he naturally has to shift the center of power to himself, but the people who control everything behind him naturally refuse to let go easily.
At this time, the emperor's usual method was to consolidate his position by "establishing the queen". Originally, the emperor's age was not much old, and he could not find someone in his twenties, so the phenomenon that ancient emperors married thirteen or fourteen-year-old girls in the flower season was formed.
Second, in addition to consolidating power, emperors usually married concubines for the purpose of forming alliances and consolidating their rule. For example, there will be a phenomenon of "marriage" in all dynasties, specifically refers to the marriage and alliance between the emperor and some remote areas to achieve the purpose of national stability. For example, during the Qing Dynasty, there was an alliance with Horqin and married a 15-year-old Zhezhe; For example, during the Kangxi period, in order to form an alliance with the important minister Sony, Kangxi married the 11-year-old Heshere.
These women were not very old and were used as a tool for marriage or to consolidate rule or to consolidate power. And there is a youngest six-year-old empress in history, and it is also an alliance formed to consolidate the emperor's regime, that is, the marriage of Shangguan Huo's granddaughter to Emperor Han Zhao, who was 11 years old when Emperor Han Zhao was 11 years old, and Empress Shangguan was only six years old.
Fourth, in order to extend the heirs, let the imperial throne or family successor someone. There is a saying called "There are three without filial piety, and no descendant is great", which has been rooted in the heart of every Chinese since ancient times. The ancients always felt that only descendants could continue the family, and this concept has influenced the Chinese from generation to generation for a long time, so that the concept of "son preference" was finally formed. Although this concept of thought has improved in modern society, it is undeniable that this concept was indeed common in ancient times.
In ancient times, men from commoner families attached so much importance to inheritance, not to mention the royal family who needed to inherit the throne. Since ancient times, the royal family has attached great importance to the issue of heirs, and the hereditary system implemented since the Xia Dynasty requires "successors" to the imperial throne.
And in ancient times, it was believed that there were many children and blessings, so the emperor's children generally had many, and there were naturally many concubines in the harem. As mentioned above, the average life expectancy in ancient times was very short, and the life expectancy of Chinese emperors was only about thirty or forty years old, so short life, naturally need to consider the issue of heirs earlier, and consider the heir must marry a wife and have children, because in order to deal with the problem of short life caused by the backward medical level of ancient times, ancient emperors usually married very early, taking advantage of youth, more heirs.
As mentioned earlier, the level of medical care in ancient times was backward, so that women gave birth to children is to walk in the ghost gate, and the standard of living at that time was not as high as it is now, and whether the child could survive after birth was also a problem, which led to the delay in increasing the number of people, and in order to increase the population base, it was necessary to get married at a young age, and then be able to have more children.
And in addition to the factor of age, there are also physical factors, the ancients believed that when you marry at a young age, you can have more children, and the physiological reasons are mostly because women are in a period of rapid development at the age of thirteen or fourteen. The ancients believed that the woman's body in this period is in the development period, so it is the best period to have children, and the child at this stage is healthy and not easy to get sick, then it has the ability to give birth to the child smoothly, and according to the concept of the ancients, if the mother is in good health, then the quality of the child is good.
If it is a woman who is too young, the body has not yet developed and cannot give birth, but when it really waits for the day of old age and decay, the risk of giving birth to a woman is high, which is likely to cause the phenomenon of both mother and child death, so it will not allow women to marry and give birth at too late.
In fact, with the development of modern science, many theories have been confirmed, most of the ancient people's ideas are the subjective assumptions of the people, thirteen or fourteen-year-old girls' bodies are in a period of development, giving birth to children in this period will make girls lose their vitality, and do not help girls' physical health, so the ancient concepts are not desirable, or to conform to the development of the times and science, get rid of the ancient bad concepts.
Fifth, in order to be more conducive to their own unification. As mentioned earlier, some ancient emperors "married" with ministers in order to consolidate their rights, and of course, there was also the phenomenon of emperors marrying their daughters and marrying with other regions.
Such practices are usually aimed at forming alliances with remote areas, the ancient Xiongnu, so that they can make fewer moves to invade the Central Plains. The emperor of ancient times naturally did not think about what his daughter thought, but only knew that doing so would benefit the country and the people, as well as his rule.
The princesses who were married off by the emperor in history were usually fourteen or five years old, and with this layer of marriage, a certain sense of "kinship" was naturally formed between the two regions, which could also ensure the long-term stability of the emperor's Jiangshan society.
Usually the princesses who marry are in their teens, on the one hand, because the situation is compelling, the princess can't wait to grow up; On the other hand, because of the influence of social concepts at that time, if the princess was not married off at too old, she would be laughed at by the people and damage the face of the royal family.
Therefore, most of the princesses who married in history were in their teenage years, such as Princess Guantao was only 15 years old when she got married, and Princess Gulun Ao Han was only 13 years old when she married Mongolia, and Qianlong's daughter was only 13 years old when she married Hejun's son.
To sum up, in summary, ancient men like to marry thirteen or fourteen-year-old women, on the one hand, because of the influence of ancient society, but also because of the influence of ancient ideas and concepts, and there is the compulsion of being in the royal family and involuntarily, but with the development of the times, people's ideas and concepts are more progressive, this concept is gradually abandoned by the times, for some ancient concepts, we can not blindly criticize, can only take its essence to its waste, conform to the development of various eras.