Ten tokens of love for ancient Chinese maidens

No one could untie the small perfume satchel for Emperor Xuanzong. Was it love or hate? Who knows it, except for Yang, the owner?

Chronicles of the Jin Dynasty Biography of Jia Wu recorded a love story between Jia Wu, the youngest daughter of Jia Cong, a favorite official of Emperor Wudi of Jin Dynasty, and Han Shou, an assistant to Jia Cong. In a lovers' rendezvous, Jia Wu gave Han some spice from the Western Regions. Han’s aroma was soon smelled by Jia Cong. He guessed out the story. He did not blame his daughter, but married her to Han instead. This turned into a story on everybody’s lips. The spice from the Western Regions should have been put in a perfume satchel made by Jia Wu herself, to match her deep affection as a maiden.

In A Dream of Red Mansion, Lin Daiyu sewed a perfume satchel, stitch by stitch, for Jia Baoyu. It was a symbol of her affections. One day, Lin misunderstood that Baoyu gave the perfume satchel to others. Feeling wronged, she cut into pieces another perfume satchel she was sewing in hand. The perfume satchel was worn by Baoyu next to the skin. How could he send it to others? When the fragrance-like Lin deceased, Baoyu could not bear to see the perfume satchel any more.

6. Jade pendant

Chinese people were fond of jade in the ancient time. There is an old saying that “Men of honor will keep jade with them, and with reasons.” Letters on Ancient Poems explains that “Decorating tassel with jade symbolizes knot of love.” Luoying was a colorful silk belt tied by women in the ancient when they got married, showing they were affiliated with their husbands. Jieli was another term in the old days to describe people getting married. There is a line in The Book of Songs, “When a daughter gets married, the mother would remind her again and again to keep fine appearances.” It depicted the scene that when a daughter was married, the mother was reluctant to part the daughter, whispered to her, while helping her bind up the silk tassel.

7. True lover’s knot

Sources of Poems had a story in which Wen Zhou fell in love with his neighbor Miss Jiang. He sent her a crystal pin as a token of love. Miss Jiang opened up her workbox, fetched twin threads, threaded them into a twin needle, and wove a true lover’s knot to return it to Wen. Plain threads imply purity, while needle sounds the same as chastity in Chinese.

Weave a brocade belt into a circular true lover’s knot and return it to the lover, It has contained all the unbroken love and passions. Xiao Yan, who was Emperor Wudi of Liang Dynasty, wrote a poem with the lines “dual-Yee waist belt, dream for the end of one mind.” Lin Bu, a poet of the Song Dynasty, left us a Ci-poem reading “Tears from your eyes, tears from mine eyes, could silken girdle strengthen our heart-to-heart ties? O see the river rise!”