Poor people in the Qing Dynasty could not marry their daughters-in-law, so how to continue the incense? Their approach is unethical

Marrying a wife and having children is the only way to go through in a lifetime, and our country is also from ancient times to the present, deeply influenced by Confucian thought, no filial piety has three queens, which refers to boys, that is, only boys can be called descendants.

The emperor's harem is three thousand, the emperor's grandchildren and nobles are all wives and concubines, the boys who give birth are princes and belles, it can be said that only men can be officials and hold power, standing above the court, but in the Qing Dynasty there are some poor people, they simply do not have money to marry their daughters-in-law, but they also want to continue the incense, it is really poor to think about change, but there is no change in the benefits, because although their methods are contrary to morality and ethics, but they really continue the incense.



The emergence of "pawn wife marriage" during the Qing Dynasty solved the problem of some poor people continuing to incense, what is the pawn wife marriage, "pawn" as the name suggests is pawn, in ancient times there were pawn shops, pawn some items, pawns are also divided into dead pawn and live pawn, dead when is no longer redeemed, it is equivalent to selling to the pawn shop, live is the agreed redemption time to redeem the goods within the specified time, but the wife is a big living person, but it is treated as a pawn such a pawn is also the feudal dynasty's disregard for the status of women. "Marriage by the wife" first originated in the Tang Dynasty, and by the Ming Dynasty it had begun to be made public, and it had become legalized in the Qing Dynasty.

"Marriage of the wife" is like a formal marriage, there is a matchmaker, the parents of both sides meet, but also give a bride price, but unlike the formal marriage, there is a wife contract, which can also be called a deed of sale, but the time of sale and redemption are agreed. This is also the affirmation of male power in the feudal period, because only men have the right to pawn their wives, for some lazy people involved in gambling, or eating, drinking and gambling, there is no doubt that the wife is a good thing without profit, but never from the wife, from the perspective of women to give respect and love, just reduce women to the machine of procreation and continuation of incense.

After the signing of the "pawn wife marriage" contract, the contract begins to take effect, in the contract time to give birth to the right party to have children, in the pawn time, can give birth to children is good luck, can not and can only admit that they are unlucky, during this period the woman can not live with the original husband, but can visit the child.

After the birth, the original husband's family came to redeem his wife with the money agreed at the time. If it cannot be redeemed as agreed, the wife in the contract may become the permanent wife of the latter, and such a tragedy also causes the loss of the mother of the woman and the children of the ex-husband, and what is even more tragic is that the wife who becomes dead is not necessarily only in this family, and may also be pawned out again by the current husband's family.

The popularity of "pawn marriage" in the Qing Dynasty also allowed some of the stupid children of large families to take advantage of the loophole, because if they saw that the poor family's wife was beautiful, they would encourage the next person or personally come forward to lobby each other, pawn their wives, and enjoy themselves, which is clearly recorded in the "Yu Shi Ming Yan".

The official Jia Mou was walking on the road, saw That Li San's wife looked beautiful as a flower, and his heart itched, so he entrusted someone to say that he wanted to buy it as a concubine, who knew that after consulting with him, he actually spent forty-two silver silver to buy it.

Although "pawn marriage" basically happens to the poor, if the concubines of rich families have not been able to have children, or cannot be loved by their masters, they will also be reduced to pawns.

There are also some women who love vanity and even directly become the concubines of the rich, and eventually fight lawsuits or make people die.

In the last year of the Qing Dynasty, there was a murder case because of the pawn wife, Zhang San because of the good gambling on credit, the family was poor, looking at the two young children moved their crooked thoughts, but as a mother, she would rather suffer her own sins than allow her children to hurt, so she became a victim, was signed by her husband to marry a "pawn wife marriage", married to Wang Si of a neighboring village, the appointment was two years, of course, Zhang San also got the money of the pawn wife, but less than a year was squandered by him, so he sold a pair of children behind his wife's back, and after the two-year file expired, Zhang San had the money to redeem his wife, but he was not willing to pawn his wife like this.

So he secretly killed Wang Si within the agreed time, and finally the county official cracked the case, and Zhang San was also sentenced to an autumn beheading, which is a typical consequence of the "marriage of the wife".

The government certainly could not agree to the existence of such a marriage, so in the case of the "marriage of the pawn wife", there were clear regulations, and both sides were fined 80 taels of silver and had to be beaten. However, this only happened after the emergence of the case, there were some normal pawns, normal redemption of private transactions, the government is also unaware.

With the collapse of the Qing Dynasty, "marriage by pawn wives" gradually faded out of the stage of history, and there were still some secret such activities in the Republic of China period, but after the founding of New China, it was completely banned. The new China gave women the status and respect they deserved, and also made women no longer just tools for procreation and pawning.