Foot-binding began in Li Houzhu Palace (Southern Tang Dynasty), and later generations followed suit. Gradually evolved into a deformed cultural aesthetic.
The Qing dynasty wanted to end foot binding long ago, but it became more and more popular.
But in the end, in fact, in the first year of Shunzhi (1644), sourdrang queen decreed that "anyone who enters the palace with foot-binding women will be beheaded". In the second year of Shunzhi, girls born in ordinary families also banned foot binding. This is the first time from the system and legal prohibition. But why is it getting higher and higher?
In the seventh year of Kangxi (1668), female foot-binding was forbidden and became popular all over the country. At that time, not only Han women but also Manchu women bound their feet. What kind of phenomenon has been achieved? Men only marry girls with little feet, so the deep-rooted custom of foot-binding is deeply rooted in the hearts of China people.
If you want to have a deeper understanding of foot binding, I recommend reading Three-inch Golden Lotus by Mr. Feng Jicai. After reading it, you will understand how painful foot binding is, and how much the heroine's grandmother and people around her value foot binding. At that time, foot binding was still very popular. It can be said that we had to wrap our feet in the torrent of that era.
The influence of western culture, the decrees of Dr. Sun Yat-sen
Influenced by western culture, some fashionable women began to stop foot binding during the Republic of China, and foot binding clubs appeared and advocated foot binding. In that era when men were superior to women, they used to attract men with small feet, but with the liberation of their minds, they no longer took small feet as beauty, and big feet could do the same.
19 12 On March 13, Dr. Sun Yat-sen, the interim president of the Republic of China, issued an order to persuade the whole country to ban foot-binding, and the movement of not binding feet was more vigorous throughout the country. What are the specific government regulations? The slogan "Don't marry a girl with little feet" was put forward, and even it was stipulated that a girl with little feet under the age of 25 was not allowed to go on the road, and "little feet donation" was collected from the girl with little feet to promote the liberation of women's little feet.
So "foot-binding" was prohibited by law, and the custom of foot-binding in China began to disappear from big cities and gradually affected remote rural areas.
But what can I say? Everything in the world has a reason. We now think that foot binding is a bad habit, shame and malady. But if it was before, even if you were Li Qingzhao and the queen, you had to bind your feet. Just like the corsets of European women in those days and the plastic surgery now, that is fashion and beauty, and that is beauty.
If you want to have a deeper understanding of foot binding, you can go to Wuzhen, Zhejiang, where there is the only foot binding culture museum in China, which displays hundreds of pairs of various "three-inch golden lotus". I believe you have a deeper understanding of China's foot-binding culture.