Several Studies On Women’s Clothing In Tang’s Harem

Clothing are necessities of human life and one of the most intuitive sign of social civilization. It is like a lens which shows the style of the whole society and people and reveals the journey of an era. Women’s clothing features in Tang dynasty become a gorgeous chapter of Chinese costume in history because of its open and bold characteristics.Tang dynasty is a large country, and the dress also has distinguishing features. But its essence lies in beauties on the harem. Tang dynasty’s three hundred years were during the great revolution, of which the country’s politics, economics, culture, ethnic relationships and aesthetic fashion has changed significantly, and all these changes above could be viewed from the harem woman’s dress characterization.This paper focuses on the fuzzy part of research ralated to women’s clothing in Tang’s harem. I mainly analyze women’s formal dress, skirts and suits in different periods and the evolution process of them and express the reasons and influences. The full text is divided into four parts:the first part, the queen’s formal dress on important occasions is analyzed, and we highlight the difference between the early stage and later periods of the Tang dynasty. We can see the continuity and gradual improvement of the ritual through this. The second part, through the literature materials, such as tomb murals and pictures handed down from ancient times, we inspects the Tang harem girls’ head suits, skirts suits, Hu suits and their change process and characteristics, which puts emphasis on combining the current situation of the country and people’s mentality change. Through this, wo can peep the history change from the peak period to weak period, and people’s psychological changes from aggressiveness and having the courage to assimilate the external culture in its early stage to pessimism, disappointment and closing their minds gradually in the late. In the third part, special groups in the harem—prostitute clothing is explored and we investigate the relationship between native culture and central plains "hufeng". And further explain the social more changes from "all-chan-centered" in the early to "discriminate against the minorities in borderland" in the late. The fourth part, this paper discusses tang imperial harem woman clothing’s influence on the neighboring countries, for example, Gaochang, an important western town, intending to illustrate the influence degree of the tang dynasty to the western culture and the influence factors. The finding by analysis is that the extent of tang culture’s impact on gaochang varies in different period. The strength of tang dynasty centralization influences more directly and aggressively than culture itself on Gaochang clothes.Tang imperial harem women as a special group, has extensive exchangeable ability. Its members not only came from the central plains, but also from the surrounding areas. So the dress is the embodiment of the overall trend and is the most accurate and complete show of Tang’s influence. It is not only the tang contemporary central and peripheral blend results, but also the most intuitive expression of the Tang society. Clothes showed the evolution of aesthetic change, a psychological change, and the change of the society. Early stage of the system became mature in kai yuan period with the social development and the weak central regime which lacked the power of execution was evident in the evolution of formal women dress. In the early period of Tang was willing to expand its land, with broad mind to accept foreign culture, making the culture of central plains popular, resulting the "nation is the same" pattern. However, after An Lushan Rebellion, Tang began to reject foreign culture and emphasize the "nation is the different", but due to their potential demand, they couldn’t completely get away from the nationalized culture which was embodied in suits and skirts, and the impact on the surrounding clothing.