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Photo, Print, Drawing China: A Manchu Bride.

About this Item

Title

  • China: A Manchu Bride.

Summary

  • This photograph by the great Scottish traveler, geographer, and photographer John Thomson (1837-1921) shows a young woman of the Manchu ethnic group in her wedding dress. She is dressed in a richly embroidered costume and a large floral headdress with tassels. Her face is powdered white. As an ethnographer, Thomson took many photographs of brides in lavish costumes, but he also expressed a gloomy view of the brides' future lives, which he compared to slavery. "No Manchu maiden can be betrothed until she is fourteen years of age. Usually some elderly woman is employed as a go-between to arrange a marriage, and four primary rules exist to guide the matron. First the lady must be amiable. Secondly she must be a woman of few words. Thirdly she must be of industrious habits, and lastly she must neither want a limb nor an eye and indeed she must be moderately good-looking." Thomson also wrote that the wife "is even liable to be beaten by her mother-in-law, and husband too, if she neglects to discharge her duties as general domestic drudge." Thomson's collection of more than 600 glass negatives, made between 1868 and 1872, was acquired by Henry S. Wellcome in 1921.

Names

  • Thomson, John, 1837-1921 Photographer.

Created / Published

  • [place of publication not identified] : [publisher not identified], 1871.

Headings

  • -  China--Beijing--Beijing
  • -  1871
  • -  Brides
  • -  Costumes
  • -  Manchus
  • -  Portrait photographs
  • -  Weddings
  • -  Women

Notes

  • -  Title devised, in English, by Library staff.
  • -  Original resource extent: 1 photograph : glass photonegative, wet collodion.
  • -  Original resource at: Wellcome Library.
  • -  Content in English.
  • -  Description based on data extracted from World Digital Library, which may be extracted from partner institutions.

Medium

  • 1 online resource.

Digital Id

Library of Congress Control Number

  • 2021669922

Online Format

  • compressed data
  • image

Additional Metadata Formats

IIIF Presentation Manifest

Rights & Access

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Credit Line: [Original Source citation], World Digital Library

More about Copyright and other Restrictions

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Cite This Item

Citations are generated automatically from bibliographic data as a convenience, and may not be complete or accurate.

Chicago citation style:

Thomson, John, Photographer. China: A Manchu Bride. Beijing China, 1871. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2021669922/.

APA citation style:

Thomson, J. (1871) China: A Manchu Bride. Beijing China, 1871. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified] [Photograph] Retrieved from the Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/item/2021669922/.

MLA citation style:

Thomson, John, Photographer. China: A Manchu Bride. [Place of Publication Not Identified: Publisher Not Identified] Photograph. Retrieved from the Library of Congress, <www.loc.gov/item/2021669922/>.