The origin and history of Miao costumes

Miao women's costumes in Xiangxi are exquisite, complex and colorful.

Miao women's clothing technology includes embroidery, flower picking, applique, flower stacking, flower mending, flower weaving and other forms. , and skilled, very distinctive.

In addition to cyan, the clothes are also based on dark fabrics such as turquoise and lake blue, with black wide edges at the neckline, cuffs and cuffs of trousers, and then inlaid with various lace and embroidery patterns. Colorful, in sharp contrast, there are cyan, blue, purple, red, white, yellow and green.

Clothing patterns are rich in connotation and imagination, and the themes range from vast nature to long history, from secular life to magical world, from various plants to creatures in the animal kingdom, all of which are contained in one pattern, including Miao people's own historical imprint, religious consciousness and aesthetic ideal.

The costumes of Miao women in western Hunan vary from region to region, mainly in the structure and style differences of collars, sleeves, hems, skirts, back pockets, aprons and belts.

According to its styles, there are pipa lapels, four forks, stacked pendulums, cloud lapels, cloud shoulders, chest lapels, four-corner cloud excavations and large lapels.

Except for the large-breasted stand collar, other models are collarless, with long and loose clothes over the waist and large and short sleeves.

During the Republic of China, the above style was still very common, and then it gradually disappeared.

As a kind of clothing, the preserved folding style is also called "dragon suit" because Miao women are willing to accept it as a housewife.

The Miao women in Huayuan, Baojing, Jishou and Guzhang wear wide shoulders, the Miao women in Fenghuang wear cloud shoulders, and the Miao women in Jishou, Luxi and Yuanling wear wide shoulders.

In a word, there are many kinds and styles of Miao women's dresses in Xiangxi, each of which independently constitutes a gorgeous Miao women's dress world.

1) Huhua Miao women's dress.

Huabao Miao women's dress is mainly popular in Huayuan, Baojing, Guzhang and Jishou.

The jacket is chest-shaped, and the chest and cuffs are set off by black base cloth, which sets off gorgeous embroidery patterns, exquisite lace and slim inlay diameter.

Some Miao women also rolled up their cuffs, deliberately revealing plain sleeves with gray, which was beautiful.

Wide-leg trousers with black patchwork at the mouth, decorated with hem, ribbon and embroidered lace, are full of flower shoes. An apron embroidered with dragons, wind, flowers, grass, insects and fish at the waist is extremely exquisite and beautiful.

In spring and summer, I like to wear white or light striped cloth and sky-blue embroidered pants. In autumn and winter, old people are used to wearing a vest over their clothes. The color of clothes is relatively calm, mostly dark blue, gray or plaid cloth woven by oneself, which sets off colorful and changeable patterns.

Cover your head with a black cloth handkerchief or a silk handkerchief. The head handkerchief is surrounded by spiral layers, and the forehead is wound into a plane. The back of the head is trapezoidal, and the end is flat on the forehead, showing exquisite charm.

2) Phoenix Miao women's dress.

Fenghuang Miao women's dress is popular in Fenghuang, Huayuan and other counties, as well as in Mayang Miao areas in the past.

This jacket is cloud-shouldered, with embroidered lace and two piping at the shoulders. Although the pattern is simple, it is exquisite and unique.

With pear-shaped embroidered chest bag, it combines with shoulders to form a beautiful arc, stretching and flowing.

Wear embroidered pants and embroidered shoes.

Phoenix headdress is a beautiful scenery in Miao women's headdress, which is tall and beautiful and strange because of its height.

Most Miao women in the terraced fields of La 'er Mountain like to use blue and white checkered handkerchiefs or tie-dyed flower handkerchiefs with plum blossom patterns.

The headscarves are stacked on top of each other and stand tall like an E-shaped crown. In case of a bad cold, add a short handkerchief and wrap it from the forehead to the back of the head and around the ear.

The most distinctive thing in this area is the shawl, the craft is extremely trivial and complicated, and the beauty is extraordinary, which shows the unique aesthetic taste of Miao women in this area.

3) Luji Miao women's dress.

Luji Miao women's dress is popular in Luxi, Yuanling, Jishou, Zhang Zhan and other cities and counties, and it is a big chest style.

The Miao people in this area call themselves "Waxiang people". Different from other Miao areas in western Hunan, women's clothes are very simple. The coat in spring and summer is pure white, and the coat in autumn and winter is blue without decorative patterns.

Wear a flower picking chest bag and a flower picking headband.

The color of picking flowers is mostly black and white or blue and white, and the pattern is neat and rigorous, and it is pure and elegant.

In Xiangxi folk songs, "there are four corners on the head handkerchief, and moths embroidered on the four corners" refers to this kind of head handkerchief.

Luxi Miao people especially like white handkerchiefs, Yuanling Miao people wear white handkerchiefs except unmarried girls and brides, middle-aged women wear blue handkerchiefs, and elderly women wear black handkerchiefs without picking flowers.

In addition, because the Miao people in Yuanling belong to the "red Miao", they still have some reservations about the custom of wearing red clothes.

Young women like to wear red striped trousers, and women like to wear red streamers with the same skirts, especially for girls' wedding dresses and old women's shrouds, which must be bright red.

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