Sacredness of Miao Embroidery
3 min readEmbroideries at Shidong Miao villages start with paper cutting. Miao ladies draw and cut them with certain patterns. Currently the paper cuts are in fairy stories.
The sacredness of the Miao embroidery is reflected in these aspects: the functions, the contents and the mental situations of the embroiderer. The Miaos regard the embroidery costumes as sacred wears and it is made with the guidance and close monitoring of the spirits and ancestors. The costume is sacred and is regarded as blesser of the family.After each use, it is packed with leather and the embroidery parts carefully protected and put to the safest possible place in the house. That is why we found when collecting directly front villages that the embroidery costumes handed down from ancestors of 6 or 7 generations before remain in excellent conditions. Only on very important festivals and events you can see all the embroidery costumes in full blossom concentrate to one place from villages and slopes all around in Guizhou’s Miao country.
If what are inherited by the males are land and houses from ancestors, then the females the embroidery costumes, which bless the family and the community prosper, far beyond the basic functions of keeping warm. The themes for embroidery are also with spiritual natures All the patterns and contents on the embroidery relate to no realistic society and real life. They are reflecting the spiritual world of the Miao people and their outlook of the world and existence, their understanding of the heaven and earth, of life and nature, of ancestry and the universe. Miao embroidery never narrates the real life and world. It could be concluded that Miao embroidery is the vehicle to pass on Miao cultures but it is no annals or historical records. In case you meet someone who says that the things or figures on some particular Miao embroidery objects relates to some one or something, then you have better be on alert. Either this man is fabricating, or what he refers to is something new and not the traditional embroidery styles. New embroidery works do have new elements, though still from Miao life and Miao country, but the value for the collectors is doubtful. Miao ancestors thought their ancestor were divinities and their gods were ancestors. So Miao people think the embroidery is for the ancestors who guide them to embroider, what, how and when.
The ancestors guide all.So for embroidery they are in pursuit of excellence, with piety and respect for ancestors and they will get blessings from ancestors, and the family will prosper, their positions among the tribal people will be higher. The woman making the embroidery will be awarded a bridegroom from best family in the village. So embroidering is something making her, her family with the destiny of the family. Naturally the Miao woman embroidering does so with extreme piety to both the Heaven and ancestors and it explains the reason why Miao women are willing to spend several years for making one single costume.
