[VOL IV] ARRIVAL OF MARRIAGE-PRESENTS AT THE BRIDAL RESIDENCE

ARRIVAL OF MARRIAGE-PRESENTS AT THE BRIDAL RESIDENCE

Cover Image: Arrival of Marriage Presents at the Bridal Residence / China / Drawn by T. Allom Engraved by W.Floyd – ALAMY Image ID:2X55NDH

*Traditional Chinese dowry is a form of money or gifts typically presented by the groom’s side to the bride’s family as part of the wedding ceremony. Dowry holds a significant place in Chinese weddings, symbolizing respect, gratitude, and blessings. These gifts can include gold or silver jewelry, red envelopes (hongbao), household items, jewelry, clothing, and various everyday necessities. The specific contents of traditional dowry can vary based on region, culture, and financial means.

The exchange of dowry usually takes place either before the wedding or on the wedding day itself as a solemn ritual. The bride’s family typically accepts the dowry presented by the groom’s side and, in doing so, conveys their blessings for the marriage. This ritual plays an important social and cultural role in Chinese weddings, signifying the union of two families and bestowing good wishes.

WHENEVER Providence has distinguished the bride from the bridegroom by rank, wealth, or other adventitious circumstances, the marriage contract in China too nearly resembles a bargain for sale and purchase. It may unquestionably be retorted, that the practice of setting a price on female loveliness degrades the social customs of European life, and that both wives and husbands are occasionally purchased in the most civilized kingdoms of Europe; yet, in all such cases, there is one redeeming virtue not found in Chinese ethics, namely, that the principal parties to the contract, the lovers themselves, have the privilege of a previous acquaintance. Should report celebrate the charms of a lady amongst the higher classes in the Celestial empire, purchasers soon appear, to solicit her hand;( † Vide Vol. III., p. 59.) and, so soon as the monetary arrangements are concluded, the suitor is permitted to send rich presents to his lady-love.

In this act of courtesy, this subscription to custom, he is joined by his relatives and private friends, who vie with each other in making offerings, costly in proportion to the dower to be received with the bride, or paid to her parents. These gifts are to be carefully distinguished from the coarser specimens of art borne in the marriage-procession.

They consist of trinkets and toilet-furniture, silks and silver-ware, and the manner of their presentation is peculiarly ceremonious. One of the chief apartments of the house is allotted to the reception of such tokens of respect; there the female heralds are admitted, and acknowledged with some degree of solemnity, while around are seated in sorrow, either serious or assumed, the sisters and near kindred of the bride. To the elder ladies of the family belongs the duty of laying out the gifts judiciously in the inner chamber; the bride meanwhile, in her broidered cap, occupying a conspicuous place, and expressing her thanks to the various messengers of kindness. The late professor Kidd observed a remarkable analogy between marriage ceremonies amongst the higher orders in several Oriental kingdoms, but especially the Malays and Chinese. “There were three days of feasting and preliminary amusements, during which the bride was visited by her friends, and adorned by her attendants with jewels, raiment, and perfumes, supposed most likely to render her acceptable to the bridegroom. On the evening of the third day from the commencement of these ceremonies, when the bride was shut up in her own apartment, with her female friends, the bridegroom came to the door, and demanded admission. A voice from within asked who was there? and on what errand the visitor had come? questions which the bridegroom answered by calling aloud his name, and demanding the young lady within to be given to him as his wife. In reply, he was desired to state what present he proposed to make, if the doors were opened? A diamond of considerable value was promised.

The door was immediately thrown open, and the husband, on presenting the precious gem, was admitted to the presence of his bride; who accompanied him to the nuptial feast spread upon a mat on the floor, on which they both sat down to eat. It was at the feast, prepared in the evening, and consisting of all the delicacies afforded by the climate and the season, with a large bowl of rice in the centre, that the ratification of the marriage agreement took place, which in its essential points is the same as among the Chinese; and was in all probability the primitive custom of sanctioning marriage. It is impossible, in referring to these observances, not to be struck with the illustrations they afford of customs and ceremonies in the Sacred Scriptures, such as decking the bride with the bride of Solomon; anointing the person of the bride with perfumes and myrrh,—the great gaiety and festivities of the party, kept up for a considerable period, according to the rank of the individuals, and various other points of coincidence.”( * Vide China, by Samuel Kidd, p. 325.)

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