Were all ancient Chinese cities as clean as in costume dramas?

Generally, our impression of ancient cities is that they are very clean and comfortable, there is a lively market during the day, quiet at night, the people live and work in peace and contentment, there is not so much garbage on the ground, and there is no littering garbage on the street. Of course, we all learned about these from TV, such as palace fighting dramas, time-traveling dramas, costume dramas, etc., and our impression of these ancient cities is too good. So are the real ancient Chinese cities as clean as in costume dramas?

In fact, no, according to the historical records, unless it is those ancient capital cities, the imperial court will send special people to clean it, in order to show that the entire city presents a prosperous scene, or in those cities where there are many people, the streets are clean and tidy, these are the instructions specially issued by the contemporary court authorities to ensure that the living environment is comfortable and decent. With the exception of these small cities, most of them are inhabited by ordinary people. The environment is naturally very different, if the management of some cities is better, then the environment that can be improved is of course more, but at that time the conditions in all aspects were not so good, many urban roads are still muddy roads, but all windy days will be dusty, especially rainy days, can not let people walk normally.

In addition, people did not have a strong sense of environmental protection at that time, and there was a lot of discarded garbage on the streets, and when the weather was hot, there would be a foul smell on the streets, and the river water was also polluted. However, in the continuous development and evolution of subsequent dynasties, this status quo has slowly improved.

But in general, most of what we see on TV are beautified cities, and they rarely show pristine ecology, because they need to present a kind of screen beauty.

Fake. In ancient times, the literacy rate of the Chinese was very low, and in general the quality of the ancient people was not so high, not to mention the awareness of hygiene. The ancient cities were not as clean as we imagined, on the contrary, the small markets were very chaotic.

Most of the cities in ancient China were dirt roads like Beijing in the Ming and Qing dynasties, and there were not many stone roads that were actually paved, and in the Ming Dynasty, citizens in southern cities such as Nanjing could enjoy clean stone roads. As for Chang'an in ancient times and Kaifeng with a population of one million in the Northern Song Dynasty, like Beijing, they were all dirt roads.

No. In ancient times, most of the roads were dirt roads, and when it rained, they were muddy. Moreover, the ancients often threw garbage and defecated everywhere, and the road sanitation situation was worrying.

Let's just put it this way. muddy ancient streets; open defecation burghers and treacherous dung diggers; Relatively realistic Western costume dramas.

Just watch the TV. The ancient cities certainly did not have the current sanitary conditions, and they must have been relatively dirty and messy, after all, it was difficult to solve the problem of food and clothing, let alone hygiene.

Fake. Manchu Beijing was known as the Dung City.

The residents of Beijing in the Qing Dynasty were very embarrassed to talk about excretion. In the summer, the manure is collected by farmers in the city, but in autumn and winter, when the crops are harvested and the demand for fertilizer is not large, the farmers do not come much, so they can only be convenient everywhere, and the manure accumulated at night is poured out in the alley in the morning. The whole residential area, filthy to the extreme.

When there is a drought, there is soil mixed with dung and urine everywhere, and when it rains, there is mud mixed with dung and urine everywhere. Only when the emperor travels, will he be covered with a layer of loess.

Probably not, there were not so many people in ancient times who could be educated, many of them were reckless, and they would not have the idea of caring for the environment, defecating in the open, dirty and muddy, stinking and filthy, this is the true face of the streets of ancient cities!

Fake, one of the first seven sons of the Ming Dynasty, Wang Tingxiang of the Ministry of War, commented on the streets of Beijing: After yesterday's rain, out of the street, a public opinion of the people tiptoed on new shoes, since the ash factory went through Chang'an Street, all chose the place, conscientious and afraid of polluting their shoes, transferred to the capital, gradually more muddy, occasionally wet, no longer regretted. Meaning:

After the rain, I wore new shoes to the court, from the ash factory to Chang'an Street, because I was afraid that the muddy water would get on the shoes, I kept avoiding, and when I arrived in the capital, there was more and more mud on the shoes, so I didn't care about it anymore.

No, the TV series is too beautified, and some cities that are relatively remote from the capital in ancient times are usually sparsely populated and relatively easy to manage, so the environment is not very good.

It must be fake, the TV series are all more exaggerated, not to mention how to deal with daily garbage in ancient times, the general treatment is directly burned with fire, and the daily sewage manure is taken to the field to make fertilizer, this time back and forth the city is definitely not so clean.

When we watched some costume dramas, we found that the streets inside were very clean, so many people felt strange, could it be that ancient people loved cleanliness so much, and the streets were very clean? ActuallyIn ancient times, the streets would not be as glamorous as in the TV series, and they could even be said to be very dirty and messy, which was actually the real face of ancient times.

Because at that time, unlike we now have special sanitation workers to clean the streets, they didn't have streets at that time, the environment must have been relatively poor at that time, no one cleaned them specifically, basically they all swept the snow in front of the door, and at that time there were no asphalt roads like we have nowAt that time, it was all dirt roads, and when it rained, the streets must be full of mud, unlike when we walk on the roads now, there is no mud. But compared to ancient times, we have no plastic waste now, so their environment and air are better than oursBut if you compare some of these greenery on the side of the street, surely they don't have it, but their environment is better than ours, because they don't have these garbage bags, and there are other things that are not easy to digest by the land, they don't have them, and we are full of dust now, and the air was much fresher at that time.

No, in fact, there was a bit of chaos on the streets in ancient times, and the reason why the TV series was so clean was for the needs of the plot effect.

Don't be fooled by costume dramas, even modern city streets can't be guaranteed to be clean. The moral standard of our modern people is much higher than that of ancient people, not to mention that there was no sewer system in ancient times, and sometimes they were excreted on the streets, and the sanitary situation at that time can be imagined.

No, in ancient times, only the streets in the town were very tidy, and the streets outside the city were not tidy, because there were no sanitation workers to clean them in ancient times.

Most of the costume dramas are filmed in the film and television city, the film and television city are all built in modern times, and the buildings and street scenes look new and clean, which is obviously not comparable to the ancient cityscape, and many contemporary cities are not as clean as the film and television city. In ancient times, without cameras, we cannot intuitively understand the environmental sanitation of the city at that time, but there are some written records about the urban environment in ancient China, and we can imagine what the urban environment was like at that time based on these written records.

Let's take a look at how the Ming Dynasty writer Shen Defu recorded the environment of the city at that time, Shen Defu has a very famous work "Wanli Yehu", which is Shen Defu recorded some current events or things he heard at that time in the form of essays (notes). Although the content recorded in "Wanli Ye Won Chapter" is not all the author's personal experience, the record of the urban environment at that time is obviously the feeling of Shen Defu's personal visit, which should be said to have great reference value, so let's take a look at how the book describes the cityscape of several cities at that time:

The streets are the widest and cleanest in Jinling, and the filthiest ones are as bad as Bianliang. After the rain, it is all dung soil, mud splashes on the waist and abdomen, and the wind blows dust after a long sunny day, and the upside down does not know. Although the Beijing division is not as good as Nanjing, it seems to be slightly better than Kaifeng."

This passage describes the street environment of Nanjing, Beijing and Kaifeng three cities at that time, the meaning is clear at a glance, it is said that the streets of Nanjing City were the most wide and clean at that time, and the health situation of Kaifeng City is worrying, when it rains, the road is full of filth such as dung, people walking on it will be splashed all over the body, but if it is a long-term sunny day, when the wind will be full of dust, it can also be imagined that the street environment of Kaifeng City at that time should be very poor, Basically, it can be judged that the streets of Kaifeng City at that time were dirt roads rather than stone roads, otherwise it is unlikely that the above description will appear. It is also mentioned in this passage that the street environment of the capital is slightly better than that of Kaifeng, but it is also much inferior to the environment of Nanjing, so it is also conceivable that the environmental sanitation of the capital at that time was not better, at least far from the clean and tidy stone road in the TV series.

Let's take a look at the late Ming and early Qing Dynasty literati Shi Xuan's record of the city's appearance at that time, Shi Xuan had such a record in his work "Yanjing Miscellaneous Records":

The things that people sweep away are all poured out of the door, the ashes of the stove, the porcelain crumbs, piled up like a mountain, the streets are higher than the house, and the people are going down the steps, like falling into the valley."

Beijing used to be called Yanjing, so "Yanjing Miscellaneous" recorded things in Beijing, and the meaning of Shi Xuan's words was also very straightforward, saying that everyone in Beijing at that time dumped the garbage cleaned at home directly outside the door, and after a long time, it was like a small hill. I think there should be an exaggeration here, and there should have been people who specialized in cleaning up the garbage on the streets in the ancient city, but it can also be seen that the environmental sanitation situation in the capital at that time was obviously not very good. The environmental sanitation situation in the capital is still like this, and there must be many other cities in the country that are not as good as the capital.

There are many examples like this, and the environmental sanitation situation in ancient cities is obviously not optimistic, and it certainly cannot be compared with the cleanliness of the streets in costume dramas.

It's not as clean as in costume dramas. The place where the aristocracy lived may be clean, but most of the commoners lived in a poor environment, with muddy paths and dusty roads, plus the people's environmental awareness was not strong, and garbage was littered.

It's not as clean as a costume drama. In ancient China, there were no cleaners, and it was difficult to ensure road hygiene, and there was a lot of garbage and debris.

I think that the management of cities in ancient times was not as developed as we are now, and it was deliberately presented for filming in TV dramas, but their streets must not be very dirty.

Ancient cities are not as clean as in TV dramas. Ancient cities did not have a sewage system, and there were no special people to clean them, and the whole city was dirty.

Of course, it's not as neat and bright as the TV series, it's very different, it's completely different from what we imagined, the ancient city is like our rural life now, it's neither neat nor magnificent, it's tattered everywhere, it's dark, and the difference is huge.

No, many streets today are not so clean and beautiful, let alone in ancient times. This is also a kind of beautification of ancient times in the layout of film and television shooting.

No, first of all, the film and television drama also adds a filter to look bright, even if the modern architectural tone is not so good-looking, the ancient architectural coloring process is not yet developed, it is easy to fade after wind and sun, and the aesthetics of the ancient people will not choose such bright colors.

I think it's about the same, because many ancient paintings or historical records, the descriptions on them are very neat and bright, and very distinctive, so I don't think it will be very different from what is presented in film and television dramas.

Now we watch a lot of ancient dramas, and we can find that the streets or houses where people live in ancient times are very tidy, but in fact, in real ancient times, whether it is the streets or some civilian homes, they will not be too tidy, because in that era, people's materials were very scarce, especially water resources, which were also very scarce, so few people would use water to clean?

No, ancient cities are often untidy, and even complicated, because the planning and sewage systems of ancient cities are not perfect and clever, and they are by no means as neat and gorgeous as in TV dramas.

Nowadays, there are many films and television about ancient times, and people are often attracted by the beauty of costume films. For example, on the street recently, there are many young ladies dressed in beautiful Han costumes, and their fairy-like postures are really beautiful.

However, in fact, people in ancient times were not as happy as they imagined. When it comes to ancient cities, we have to take out the Song painting "Qingming Riverside Map". Because this painting is recognized as a realistic work, Bianliang City in the Song Dynasty represents a very high level of urban construction.

Therefore, this painting shows the pinnacle of the ancient city, let's take a look, whether it is different from the film.

Let's talk about the lives of the ancients separately.

Let's talk about the aspect of living first.

In ancient times, there were no reinforced concrete, cars, running water, no gas pipelines, and no air conditioning in the room. Therefore, ancient buildings mainly used materials such as earth, wood, bricks and stones, and at the same time considered keeping warm in winter and cool in summer.

In ancient times, the foundations of houses were generally made of stones, and the walls of government offices and wealthy families were mostly made of bricks. Those who have no money tend to use bricks only in the corners of the walls, and adobe for the rest; The more rudimentary ones are made of straw and mud. The wall is very thick, which can block the flow of heat, and has the effect of warming in winter and cooling in summer.

The beams are mostly column-type, and the roof is load-bearing on the columns, so the wall can collapse without collapsing, and there is an anti-*** effect.

Most of the roofs are made of tiles, and some temples and courts are made of glazed tiles, and so on. Some poor families can't afford tiles, so they simply use straw to make roofs. Finally, people will install a lot of sacred beasts on the roof ridge to ward off evil spirits and pray for blessings, and the sacred beasts are fired like bricks and tiles.

The interior of the house is decorated, and the exquisite rich will plaster the walls with lime, which looks white and elegant. The poor can't wipe the lime, and will replace it with mud.

It's just an ordinary building, practical and not fancy, nothing to look at.

Of course, there were also buildings like those in movies and television in ancient times. The way the religious building temple and the court are built will look a little mysterious, but it is very beautiful. The roofs of these buildings tend to be colorful, and the eaves are in the style of cornices.

There will be carvings and paintings on beams and columns, and the so-called carved beams and painted columns are said to be this. The tables and chairs in the house are also made of wood, and they are full of carvings. The floors are also paved with fine bricks, or polished stone tiles.

Most of the buildings in <> Film City are palace-style buildings, similar to ancient courts. But in ancient times, there were no electric lights, and even if candles were used in the court, they were not as bright as in movies and television.

Let's talk about clothes. The people in the film and television are all dressed in bright clothes, but the ancients were not like this.

There were not enough human clothes until the advent of petroleum clothing, and the clothing problem was finally solved.

The color, material, and pattern of ancient clothes in our country are all required, and they cannot be worn indiscriminately. For example, in the Ming Dynasty, Zhu Yuanzhang executed many people for wearing clothes in violation of regulations.