Why do we have the custom of surnamed Huang and Guo?

Huangping Mountain is located in the southeast of Longjiao Mountain, daye city, Hubei Province, about 40 kilometers away from Huangshi City. Ping Huang Village is located on a sunny hillside in the hinterland of Huangping Mountain.

Walking into Ping Huang Mountain Village, I saw a bamboo forest around the village, which was very quiet and comfortable. Ping Huang mountain village is not big. According to villager Huang Jiming, there are only more than 80 families and more than 400 people here. The villagers' economic sources are mainly cash crops on the mountain, such as weaving bamboo products, picking Chinese herbal medicines and tea. Due to the relatively weak economic income of the villagers, most of the young people in the village left home and went out to work, and most of them were old people, women and children. Perhaps because of the perennial sea of clouds, beautiful peaks and fresh air, there are many long-lived elderly people in the village.

The reporter found a strange phenomenon in the village. The residents of Ping Huang Mountain Village are all surnamed Huang, but Guo's ancestors are enshrined in their ancestral hall. Especially on the beam above the gate of his ancestral temple, it is clearly written that "Fenyang is the oldest". According to historical records, there was a famous general in the Tang Dynasty named Guo Ziyi, whose ancestral home was Fenyang, Shanxi, and he was born in Wuju. He was our ambassador in the Anshi Rebellion, defeated Shi Siming in Hebei, ranked first in the rebellion, and was promoted to the position of Secretary of the Central Secretariat, sealing Guo Ziyi. In Tang Daizong, Tubo and Uighur invaded Guanzhong area, and Guo Ziyi correctly adopted the strategy of forming an alliance with Uighur to fight Tubo, thus maintaining the peace of the country. Guo Ziyi served as an official all his life and made many great achievements. At the age of 84, he bid farewell to the battlefield. Because of him, the world has been peaceful for more than 20 years. He "ruled the world without envy, and raised a generation without doubt", enjoying high prestige and reputation throughout the country. In the long history, the descendants of Guo will be regarded as the ancestors of Guo. Therefore, in their ancestral halls or ancestral halls, they are all called "Fenyang Old Place".

Next to the "old place of Fenyang" in the village, there is an auditorium built during the people's commune in the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China. The building area of the auditorium is more than 2,000 square meters, and there is "Long live Chairman Mao!" Above the towering gate. Below the slogan is a mural of Tiananmen Square made of cement. The auditorium is called "Songzhuxuan". There is a big stage in the auditorium, on which the woodcarving preserved in the Cultural Revolution reads "Long live Chairman Mao", and there are a pair of cauldrons made in the Great Leap Forward era on one side of the stage. It is said that villagers ate clay pot rice in those days. Today, the auditorium has become a warehouse in the village, but every festival, the villagers will carry out some entertainment activities on the stage and become the cultural and entertainment center in the village.

Then, why do the villagers in Huangpingshan also call them after the famous Tang Dynasty star Guo Ziyi?

Magical and ancient customs

In Ping Huang mountain village, many villagers couldn't tell the reason of this ancient custom, but some villagers said that from the Tang Dynasty to the middle of the Ming Dynasty, a descendant of Guo Ziyi moved to Jiangxi, and because of the turbulent situation, he moved from Jiangxi to Daye Yinzu, Hubei. At the end of the Ming dynasty, I don't know what great changes took place that year. The descendants of Guo, who fled from Yanzu, lived in seclusion in the mountains and changed Guo's surname to Huang. As for why? What is the change? There is no written record. Since then, they have spent more than 500 years in obscurity in the mountains. In order to remember our ancestors, we can only return to Guo after death. Therefore, the practice of "surnamed Huang before death and surnamed Guo after death" has been followed for hundreds of years.

There are also many villagers who don't agree with this legend, but can't find other scientific basis, thus leaving an unsolved mystery for their descendants.

Huang Jiming told reporters another legend. In the early Ming Dynasty, their ancestor Gui Yong gave birth to only one girl. Because there were no boys, the girl grew up and married a boy named Guo. Later, the girl gave birth to a lovely little grandson for Gui Yonggong, who was deeply loved by Gui Yonggong. Gui Yonggong said to the Huang clan: "You can't forget Huang Zu in life, but Guo Zu in death." . In this way, the descendants of Huang who lived in this generation remembered the teachings of their ancestors. They were Huang before their death and Guo after their death. Huang Jiming and other villagers took the reporter to see the tombstones of several ancestors buried under the thick soil of the South Pearl Castle Peak, and the epitaphs of the villagers after their death. The inscription is Guo, not Huang.

In this regard, some people think that if you use public money because Huang has no male children, how can you explain the "Fenyang is the first" in their ancestral hall? Why did Huang worship Guo's ancestors? The reporter interviewed several old people in Ping Huang Mountain Village. They all heard their own "mystery of life experience" and couldn't find a reasonable explanation, which painted this ancient village hidden in the mountains with mysterious colors. The "mystery of life experience" of the villagers in Huangpingshan Village is even more confusing.

There is also an old custom in Ping Huang mountain village. Every year, when villagers eat New Year's Eve, they will come to the "old place of Fenyang" before 5: 00 in the morning, set the table in front of the ancestors of the Guo family, pay homage to their ancestors first, and then take them home for New Year's Eve. The villagers called it "Shanggengfan". This ancient custom has been passed down to this day.