EVERYDAY LIFE · SHANG TO QING
Stories
Small questions open a window onto a different world.
The Song Summer: Ice-Cold Rice Balls and a List of Cold Drinks
Kaifeng's summer night market sold iced rice balls, liquorice ice water and lychee paste in red lacquered boxes; only two shops outside the old gate sold ice itself, in silver vessels.
Baskets, Small Fish and 'Cat Correction': The Cat Trade of Song Cities
Lin'an's register of small trades lists cat baskets, cat fish, cat selling and a mysterious 'cat-and-dog correction'; Kaifeng delivered cat food and small fish daily.
Sweet Water on the Buddha: The Business of the Buddha's Birthday
On the Buddha's birthday, Kaifeng's monasteries shared fragrant sweet water; in Lin'an monks walked the great houses ladling it over bronze images 'to seek alms', while West Lake held a release-of-life market.
From Buried Coins to Burned Paper: The Making of Money for the Dead
A Tang writer described paper money carried before coffins and burned for spirits. A Tang history blamed it on a chancellor. By the Song it was seasonal stock, on sale days before the festival.
Why a String of a Thousand Coins Was Counted as 770
In Northern Song Kaifeng a string of a thousand coins was reckoned at 770. Six trades used six different rates, and by the Southern Song the street rate had fallen to fifty.
Where the Lanterns Came From: Craft and Trade in Song China
A Song lantern began as a craft: the 'boneless' lantern used a silk bag packed with millet as its mould. Suzhou, Fuzhou and Xin'an ranked the trade, and every city had a lantern market.
Beating the Spring Ox: The First Day of Spring in Song China
The day before spring began, Kaifeng's prefecture sent an ox into the palace to be whipped; outside its own gate, the same morning, townspeople sold toy oxen and paper banners.
The Guild Elder and the Matchmaker: How Song Cities Hired People
In Song cities you hired through an intermediary: guild elders supplied cooks, clerks and chair-bearers, brokers brought women servants, and a surety stood behind every name.
A Street of Specialists: Doctors and Drug Shops in Song China
North along Maxing Street in Song Kaifeng the shops were sorted by body part: teeth and throat, children, childbirth. Lin'an added a named drug market and a guild roster that conscripted physicians.