THE CRAMPING OF WOMEN'S FEET IN CHINA.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 2698, 26 October 1889, Page 6 (Supplement)

THE CRAMPING OF WOMEN'S FEET IN CHINA.

A native Chinese journal, discussing the practice of cramping ladie's feet, says that in 1604 the great and enlightened J£mperor Kanghsi issued an edict forbidding it under heavy penalties, and calling upon all local officials to suppress the custom. But four years later, on the advice of the Board of Ceremonies, he withdrew the edict, and left the ladies free to follow their own tastes. The origin of the strange custom seems to be lost in obscurity. In the eighth century of our era the wife of an Emperor of the Tang dynasty is said to have worn shoes only three inches lonir, and Oiie theory assigns the practice to the fourth century A.D, "when I'au Fei danced before the last of the Sovereigns of the Tsi dynasty, and every footstep made a lily grow." It is also said that it originated in the tenth century, when a beautiful concubine of one of the Emperors " tied up her foet with silk into the shape of the crescent moon, and all the other beauties of the time imitated her." The older poets make no reference to the cramped foot, but sing of the beauty of the snowwhite feet of the women of their times, when the foot gear, when it was worn, was square-toed for men and round-toed for women. The native writer thinks the custom was progresivo, and only gradually attained its present pitch. In the two southern provinces it is universal ; but in many places women'sfeet areof the natural size.