Naxi Costume

Naxi Costume

The elegant and simple Naxi costume is a wonderful flower of its traditional culture. Young women's clothing colors are more focused on bright and gorgeous colors, while middle-aged and old women's clothing colors are mostly made of blue, black and other colors, which is solemn and elegant. Take "the stars and the moon" as an example.

Brief introduction of clothing

The Naxi Women are famous for their diligence, ability, virtue and kindness. Their traditional costumes have distinctive national characteristics, forming their own unique style.

There are also differences in clothing: Naxi Women in Dayan area of Lijiang County wear a wide sleeve cloth robe with a large skirt, with sleeves rolled to the elbow, plus purple or navy camisoles; they wear trousers, with a waist made of black, white and blue cotton cloth, with pleats on the top and a sky blue wide edge on the bottom; they wear "Seven Star sheepskin" on the back, with two white belts sewn on the upper end of the sheepskin The front is crisscrossed and tied at the back of the waist. Sheepskin shawl is elegant and generous, which can not only play a decorative role, but also warm up and protect the body, so as to prevent the damage to the shoulder and back when working. Sheepskin shawl is an important symbol of Naxi Women's dress in Lijiang. It is usually made of a whole piece of pure black sheepskin. It is cut into a circle above and below, with a black edge 6 cm wide sewn on the top. Next, it is nailed with seven colorful embroidered circular cloth plates in a row, with two white sheepskin streamers hanging at the center of each circle. It represents the Big Dipper, commonly known as "the stars and the moon". It symbolizes that Nasi women go out early and return late, and wear the stars and the moon to show their diligence. Another view is that the upper and lower round sheepskin is cut to imitate the shape of frogs, while the disc on the back is called "BAMIAO", which means "eyes of frogs". This is the product of the integration of the indigenous farmers in Lijiang who worship frogs and the ancient Qiang people who worship sheep and form the Nasi nationality.

Costume legend

There are many speculations and explanations about Naxi people's sheepskin shawl in the folk and academic circles, and there are many myths and legends about it. It is said that long ago, the Naxi people lived in the mountains by the lake and lived a quiet life. But one year, a ferocious drought demon appeared. He sent out Eight Suns to scorch the earth with the original sun. There was no night in the world, and the earth was scorched everywhere. There is a Naxi girl named yinggu who is determined to invite the Dragon King to Donghai. She weaves a colorful "dingyang shirt" with bird feathers and runs to the East on her back. When yinggu arrived at the east coast, she happened to meet the Third Prince of the dragon. They fell in love. The Dragon King sent the third prince to accompany her back to her hometown to relieve the drought. Shiji, the hateful Hanmo, plunges the Third Prince of the Dragon into a deep pool and lets the elephant and the lion guard the mouth of the pool. Poor yinggu fights with Hanmo for nine days. Finally, she falls to the ground because of exhaustion. From then on, this place is called "yinggudun" (Lijiang). The Third Prince of the Dragon rushed out of the deep pool and rushed to the place where yinggu fell, turning into a spring in Lijiang. Seeing this, Baisha made a snow dragon, swallowed seven suns in a row, and vomited the cooled sun back to the ground, leaving only one sun to turn it into the moon. The three gods made seven cold suns into seven shining stars and inlaid them in yinggu's dingyang shirt as a commendation. In memory of yinggu, the Naxi girls made exquisite sheepskin shawls according to yinggu's dingyang shirt, which symbolizes hard work and courage. They have been handed down from generation to generation and have been handed down to the present day. Therefore, sheepskin shawls have the meaning of "wearing stars and wearing moon", implying the hard work of Naxi people.