The taboo of funeral procedure in southern Fujian needs specific details.

China's traditional funeral customs are generally a mixture of primitive ideas and feudal ideas, which have been circulated among the people for thousands of years, forming local customs and people's feelings.

1. 1 Jianghan plain: gongs and drums are like weddings and funerals.

In Jianghan Plain, people usually play the trumpet and gongs and drums when they get married, and only play gongs and drums when attending the funeral of the deceased. However, there is a special custom in Haokou Town of Qianjiang. No matter whether you get married or attend a funeral, you only play gongs and drums and don't play the trumpet.

Legend has it that there was once a county grandfather in Qianjiang, who was a famous goat. As soon as he heard the horn sounded, he ordered his men to drag the bride into the county government all night, and many young men and women gave their lives in the resistance.

Before marrying a daughter-in-law, a poor scholar had a brainwave and married with a knell drum, that is, only those who beat gongs and drums, set off firecrackers and didn't blow the trumpet were invited to get married. Sure enough, the poor scholar married his daughter-in-law safely, but the county grandfather didn't know it at all.

Later, people learned to marry like a poor scholar. After a long time, it gradually became a custom and has been passed down to this day. Now you don't play the trumpet when you get married in Qianjiang area.

1.2 Jingzhou: Please drink Forgetting Soup.

"Going out for three or five miles, there are local customs everywhere." The funeral customs of Jingzhou counties are different and have their own characteristics. It is said that Yan Ye sent "impermanence" to recruit those who have been written off from the book of life and death. Therefore, there is a custom in Songzi county: when the patient is dying, his relatives should invite a strong man to sit around the bed with a sword and put a fishing net on the bed, saying that this can prevent impermanence from approaching the patient. Once a person dies, family members will burn "gas-reducing paper" outside the door. This is a straw sandals fee for a mistake, so that he should not be too rude when escorting ghosts; People also ask monks to "clear the way" and burn paper carts and horses to let the dead walk instead of walking; The purpose of "opening the throat" is to let the dead eat in the underworld.

There is another custom in Xiantao area. After death, put some tea leaves in the mouth of the deceased. Legend has it that people don't forget their loved ones after death, and they cry every day and refuse to see the king of hell. Yan made a kind of "forget the soul soup", put some tea leaves in the soup and sent a hag to persuade the dead to drink. The dead man cried dry and thought the tea was served, so he took it and drank it. As a result, he forgot everything and went to see the dead.

I don't know how to let the family of the deceased know about it. They don't want the dead to forget their loved ones, so they try to fool the hag. Put some tea in the deceased's mouth in advance, and when the hag came to persuade him to drink "forget the soup", he saw tea residue in the deceased's mouth and thought that he had forgotten the soup. So that the dead won't forget their loved ones.

1.3 Huanggang, Northeast Hubei: Husband dies, wife dies, and sister cries.

Huanggang City in the northeast of Hubei Province has a peculiar custom. Whether the husband dies or the wife loses her husband, when they cry, they always say "Sister!" Why not call them sisters but husband and wife? It is said that this is a custom handed down from ancient times.

According to legend, when Pangu opened the heavens and the earth, there was no one in the world. Pangu pondered how to make people. When he looked up and saw the sun and the moon, he asked them to get married and have children.

Sister Moon, who is clever in character, turned pale with fear when she heard Pangu's words, and quickly hid in the Woods. Brother Sun blushed and said to Pangu, "We are brother and sister, how can we get married?" Pangu said, "There is no one in the world. What do you want the sun and the moon to do? I tell you, I have a pair of stone mills here. Each of you takes a mill and rolls it from the sky to the ground. If you run together, you will get married. Can't be together, or brothers and sisters. " Sun nodded in agreement.

Pangu gave the mill to the sun and the moon, and they lifted it and rolled it down. Pangu secretly used his hand a little, and the carts just closed together. Pangu said, "This is God's will, so you have to do it." The sun is still hesitating for fear of jokes from future generations. Pangu gave him a needle and said, "If someone dares to look at you and smile, you can prick his eyes with a needle."

Brother Sun and Sister Moon got married. From then on, couples in the world called each other brothers. Future generations dare not look at the sun, and it hurts to look at their eyes.

1.4 Man Mei: Tie the deceased to a chair.

There is a strange custom in Man Mei, that is, after death, the body should be held in a chair, tied with a rope and put a small square table in front of the deceased. Why is there such a custom

It is said that once upon a time, a daughter-in-law often abused her mother-in-law, and her mother-in-law had to swallow it when she was old.

Soon, her mother-in-law died and her body was put on a chair. Relatives and friends came to offer their condolences, and her daughter-in-law got into a chair and cried. Unexpectedly, her mother-in-law pestered her, jumped up from her chair and hugged her daughter-in-law desperately, but people couldn't get rid of her.

Daughter-in-law knew that her mother-in-law had died and remembered her unfilial behavior, so she had to tell her how to abuse her mother-in-law one by one in front of many villagers. Everyone knelt down to plead for their daughter-in-law, and her mother-in-law slowly released her hand and sat down in the chair.

Later, people were afraid that this would happen again, so they tied the deceased to a chair and put a table in front of it so that the deceased could not jump.

1.5 Tujia people: happy to die.

Funeral jumping is a unique funeral custom of Tujia nationality, also known as "relieving worries" and "kindred". This custom of dancing in front of the dead to show condolences and encouragement is said to have been handed down by Ba people.

In Tujia mountain village, no matter which old man died, neighbors came from all over the country regardless of fatigue and danced for the dead all night. Changyang has such a ballad: "Listen to the death knell in the middle of the night, whether it is the south or the north, you are the south and I want to go, you are the north and I want to go, so I can't afford tofu to send my feelings." I can't ring the bell all night. " The family members of the deceased also prepared wedding wine early to make room for the funeral, and parked the coffin of the deceased in the center of the mourning hall, with a homemade cowhide drum in front of the coffin.

With three gunshots outside the door, groups of men, women and children poured into the room. They invited each other in the open space in front of the coffin, singing and dancing while standing on the drum. Their heads, hands, shoulders, waist, arms, feet and feet move in harmony and dance at different paces. They high-five each other from time to time; Sometimes put your elbow around your back; Sometimes twist your shoulders and wipe your back; Sometimes the lips touch the ground, saying that it is "the swallow contains mud"; Sometimes stand on tiptoe and squat down and rotate; Sometimes play with each other; Sometimes silent; Sometimes whistle and sing. It's hard to say whether it's happy or sad. However, Tujia people have such a habit: they are happily buried with them and do funerals with joy.

1.6 Wuhan: the wonders of grave-sweeping in Tomb-Sweeping Day

Before and after each visit to Tomb-Sweeping Day, the cemetery areas such as Shimen Peak, Biandan Mountain and Jiu Feng, which have always been deserted and silent, suddenly became lively. The sound of cars, firecrackers, crying, laughter and vendors selling incense, paper and food spread all over the fields. I saw fireworks all over the mountain, and people crowded from the foot of the mountain to the top of the mountain, forming a unique custom landscape of sacrifice and sweeping in Wuhan.

What Wuhan people value most is the temple fair sacrifice and the mountain god sacrifice. Once upon a time, rich people had to burn 9 1 Jin of paper money to show their support for the "narrow escape" of the deceased, and they also had to light 9 incense sticks and 9 red candles. The food provided must be meat buns and sweet cakes, so that the deceased will not be entangled by vicious dogs when he is reincarnated.

Of course, most of these old rules no longer exist today, but Wuhan people still retain some traditional customs, but they are different in form. For example, when sweeping graves, people take their families and friends for an outing. After the sacrifice, people sit around and eat a cage of wine, food or bread and cold drinks, then go for a spring outing and dig wild vegetables while chatting. It is said that this kind of wild vegetable can make people avoid evil spirits and prevent diseases. Some families do not have family graves, but also take grave sweepers to the suburbs, choose an elegant place, draw a circle on the spot with branches as the graves of ancestors, burn paper and incense, then sit on the floor, have a picnic and finally walk in the country. This kind of family takes sweeping the floor as the second place and outing as the main thing.

Funeral custom: funeral period

Dying refers to the stage from death to coffin. Filial piety occupies a very important position in China's traditional culture and is regarded as the foundation of virtue. Confucius said to Ceng Zi, a disciple who is famous for his filial piety, more than 2,000 years ago: "If a husband is filial, he will be a relative, and if he is a gentleman, he will eventually be established." However, since ancient times, the universal standard to measure "filial piety" mainly depends on its attitude towards parents' "birth, support and burial", so the characteristics of filial piety are very obvious from the beginning of the funeral ceremony.

Anyone who has reached the age of 50 or is a "grandfather's (grandfather's) mother (grandmother's)" will "go to class" at the end of his life, that is, let him lie at home or on a simple bed made up of four bed boards by the ancestral temple, and his children, grandchildren and daughter-in-law will wait for him to die. The deceased will die, and relatives should change their shroud, shoes and socks while crying, and act quickly. If you die too late, you will be suspected of "the dead are gone." Immediately after the death of the deceased, the body and face were covered with sheets, and relatives wailed around the body, and the funeral ceremony began.

When the filial piety man goes out, he takes back a piece of soil from the pool, embankment or intersection, uses tiles to pick it up, burns incense on the soil, and puts it on the ground at the foot of the corpse to show that it is safe for people to die underground. A bowl of rice and a pair of bamboo chopsticks are put on it, which is called "foot-tail rice" or "resignation rice". Relatives should continue to burn incense and paper (paper money used in the underworld) and prepare enough "tolls" for the dead to go to the underworld. In order to make the deceased go to the light, it is still necessary to light the white candle or oil lamp, and be careful not to put it out, which is called "burning the tail candle". If you add the "birthday celebration" erected a hundred years after the deceased's death, and the "paper sacrifice" burned when he made meritorious service after his death (including all kinds of daily necessities made of paper, even servants and cars), it can be said that it is of great help to the clothing, food and car of the deceased.

The funeral home should hang a piece of white cloth on the gate, or cover the original red couplet with white paper to let people around know, and send a message to relatives in other places or overseas so that children can hear the news and attend the funeral. Among them, it is especially prudent to report the funeral to the relatives in marriage. In ancient China, intermarriage was popular among ethnic groups, but they had different surnames, so joint marriage became an extremely important emotional bond to strengthen the relationship among tribes, clans, families and surnames. Therefore, when describing the role of marriage, the Book of Rites first emphasizes "the sum of two surnames". However, the results of common marriage often have twists and turns because of the unfortunate death of one party. In Quanzhou, some in-laws died because they suspected that their daughters were abused in their in-laws' homes (some of them were true), so they gathered troops to go to their in-laws' homes to "eat people's lives". Therefore, people attach great importance to their in-laws when holding funerals for their female elders, and have formed some corresponding customs, which are recorded in detail in the newly compiled Annals of Anxi County and Annals of Customs.

Before the funeral, the filial male elder should carry a small bucket, lead the whole family to a nearby public well for water as soon as possible, return to the door, fetch a bowl of water, wash the body in the house, pour the remaining water out of the door, and then hold a "farewell ceremony" for the deceased before entering the funeral. When you are buried, you should avoid all the five elements of the zodiac and avoid "rushing". After burial, filial piety should send the daily necessities used by the deceased to the suburbs or outside the village for burning, commonly known as "sending grass" or "sending feet and tails" After the event, Taoist priests will perform some fierce exorcism ceremonies indoors and outdoors, commonly known as "gathering witches" (or the end of the wake).