EVERYDAY LIFE · SHANG TO QING
Stories
Small questions open a window onto a different world.
No Slot in the Roster: How the Idle Men of Hangzhou Made a Living
Two Hangzhou guidebooks keep a chapter on 闲人, men with no trade who lived off the rich: lettered hangers-on, bird handlers, barbers who brokered deals, and men who sold a greeting.
Shadows on a Paper Screen: Puppet Theatre in Song China
Song shadow puppets began as cut paper and moved to coloured sheepskin; faces were carved to show loyalty or villainy, and four kinds of puppet shared the quarter with storytellers.
One Hundred and Twenty Coins: Fame and Price in a Song City
A bowl of gourd soup cost 120 full coins beside the emperor's viewing stand and ten in an ordinary shop. What the gap measures, and how a fish-soup seller grew rich.
The Wedding Was Rented: Hiring a Banquet in Song China
A Song city household could stage a wedding without owning the chairs, the wine cups or the cooks. The rental lists show a service economy built on things returned the next day.
The Basin of Coins: Gambling for Goods in Song Kaifeng
In Northern Song Kaifeng, guanpu sold goods by gambling: three days at the New Year, a month at the imperial pond, coins tossed into a basin, and odds up to thirty to one.
How a Ming City Ran: The Ward Headman's Night Round
A Ming city ran on curfews, ward headmen, state-built shopfronts and a scale checked every three days, not on a city government with a budget.
Who Put Out the Fires in Song China?
In Song China firefighting was a standing military duty: five soldiers to every three hundred paces, brick watchtowers, and flags and lamps that told the whole city where the fire was.
The Register Came First: Earning a Living in Tang China
Tang statutes fixed what a load, a day and a year were worth, before the register decided who could do which work. What the state priced, and what it left out.
What Kaifeng Ate Before Daylight
In the Northern Song capital, breakfast started at the fifth watch with a monastery runner's wooden fish, a hundred bakery ovens, and a bowl of gourd soup for ten cash.