Why did ancient men have long hair?

There are two main reasons for this. First, it is filial piety. The body is a skin injury, and parents dare not hurt it. Filial piety begins. It is unfilial to damage the body without authorization; Secondly, in ancient criminal law, shaving hair was called kun 1, which was one of the five punishments in ancient China. Shaving off all or part of hair is a humiliating punishment, which was mainly popular in China from Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties to the Eastern Han Dynasty.

Qiu refers to shaving the prisoner's hair and beard. Qiu punishment is a kind of punishment imposed on prisoners in the form of personality insult. The ancients thought that parents who suffered from skin pain did not dare to destroy it, and filial piety began! So it's a pity to shave his hair. During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, Buddhism prevailed. Because it was a big unfilial act for Buddhists to shave their heads and not get married, people at that time despised them as "Kun people".

Kun punishment originated in the Zhou Dynasty. In the royal family, those who commit castration take Kun for the palace, that is, long hair is broken into short hair. By the time of the Qin Dynasty, it lost this nature and became a punishment to shave off the beard of the prisoner. In ancient China, it was normal for men to grow hair and beards. This punishment takes the form of forcibly shaving the hair and beard of criminals, which makes criminals in an obvious abnormal state and makes them feel pain.

There is a famous story that may be familiar to friends. That is, Cao Cao once ordered not to trample on farmland when marching. He wants to protect farmers. If anyone's horse stepped on the wheat field, it would be a crime of decapitation, so Cao Cao's cavalry all dismounted and walked, holding the horse in one hand and protecting the wheat with something in the other, and walked carefully. Cao Cao didn't dismount himself (a pheasant flew out of the ground), so the horse was surprised and jumped into the wheat field. Cao Cao's horse trampled on the wheat field. Cao Cao dismounted at once, called the military judge and said, What shall we do? The military judge said, beheaded. Cao Cao said you should be put to death. Well, how is that possible? Anyway, there is this tradition in ancient times. A commander-in-chief can't punish doctors, can't cure Shu Ren, can't apply laws to venerable ones, and can't be beheaded. Cao Cao said there was nothing he could do, so he cut his hair. He drew his sword, cut off a hair and threw it on the ground, indicating that he had been punished.

Therefore, there are actually more internal factors for ancient people to have long hair, not that short hair is not good-looking, or that long hair looks good. I estimate that if Manchu people didn't enter the customs in Qing Dynasty, our long hair tradition would leave a lot. Although the way of life and work in modern society sometimes makes long hair inconvenient, there are still a large number of people who follow the tradition of long hair, and those men who have long hair will inevitably not be regarded as pseudo-art, sissy and the like.