The word mound can be traced back to the time of the Yellow Emperor, and there is such a passage in the historical records and the Feng Zen book: "In the winter of the coming year, the council said: 'The ancients first revitalized the army and released the brigade, and then sealed the Zen. 'Nai Sui patrolled the north of Shuofang, extorted more than 100,000 soldiers, and also sacrificed to the Yellow Emperor's Tomb Bridge Mountain, and released the soldiers as such. Shang said: 'I heard that the Yellow Emperor is not dead, and there is a grave today, why not?' Or say: 'The Yellow Emperor has gone to heaven, and the ministers buried his clothes.' ’”

What this means is that after the death of the Yellow Emperor, the body could not be found, and the ministers erected a mound for his old man.

The mound is divided into two types, one is like the Yellow Emperor, who cannot find the body of the deceased, and replaces it with the clothes of the deceased before his death and puts it in the coffin.

The other is some celebrities, people in order to commemorate him, in the place where he lived, set up a mound of clothes, among which there is Sun Yat-sen, his old man's dragon coffin house in Beijing Biyun Temple. In 1929, a mound was erected in Nanjing to commemorate his old man's contribution to China.

However, there are different understandings of the mound in rural areas, and some people believe that the mound is an empty grave, which means to curse future generations to die sooner, so as to fill the empty grave; Some people believe that the mound is a memorial service for the deceased, and there is no curse in it.

On these two statements, from ancient times to the present, has been a constant controversy, the public says that the public is reasonable, the mother-in-law says that the mother-in-law is reasonable, and the evolution to the present, the mound has become a kind of commemoration, is the exclusive use of celebrities.

The reason why I propose to get a well-dressed grave is mainly because the father and son are very filial, if they don't let them do something for the deceased, it is estimated that they will feel guilty and live unnaturally in this life.

It's a bit far, let's get down to business. There are not many things that need to be prepared for the burial mound of clothes, just a coffin, some clothes of the deceased before his death, and things needed for ordinary funerals.

These things are relatively common, and it only took us a little more than an hour to find them and move them to the hall. During this period, Wang Xi led Qing Xuanzi here, and Qing Xuanzi said hello to me and stayed in Zhuyuan. When I was having lunch, Wang Xi went to call him, but he didn't come back to eat, saying that it was a bit difficult to do things, so let me do the funeral first and leave him alone.

After eating, I was about to be a 'dead man' with a piece of yellow [colored] paper, Guo Fatzi walked up to me impatiently and asked, "Brother Jiu, let's make all this nonsense, isn't it a bit of a fuss?" ”

I glanced at him suspiciously, and I didn't understand what he meant, so I asked him, "What do you mean?" ”

He said: "If you can't find the body, just go to the mountain and set up a clothed mound, what are you doing in the hall?" ”

I glared at him and said, "Go directly to the mountain to erect a mound of clothes and mounds, that is a memorial, our mound is a little different, we have to do it according to the funeral, just take this yellow [color] paper in my hand to say, it needs to cut out a human shape, and then use a cinnabar pen to write the name of the deceased and the eight characters of birth, and use it to represent the deceased." ”

He was stunned, reached out and touched the yellow paper, and without speaking, he stood aside, took out his mobile phone, and played.

I smiled wryly, shook my head, and went back to the task at hand. It is worth mentioning that in some places, the clothes and mounds are not made of paper-cut people, but of the paper people tied with bamboo strips, and then the name of the deceased and the eight characters of birth are written on it.

I cut this kind of paper figure, just a form, about 30 centimeters long, can roughly distinguish the head and limbs, and the paper figure is different from the world, of course, they all have the same function, used to replace the dead.

After cutting the paper figures, we will decorate the hall, all according to our Hengyang customs, first put two long wooden benches in the middle of the hall, then put the coffin on the wooden bench, and finally put a table of eight immortals at the front end of the coffin.

After getting these things, I called all of Wang Xi's family over and asked them to prepare for the 'burial' ceremony.

There is a difference between the burial of paper people and the burial of the deceased, I asked them to kneel in front of the table of the eight immortals, burned yellow paper, cried and mourned, and asked Guo Fatzi and the two of them to stand on both sides of the coffin, each holding a tile in their hands, and I was ready to invite the paper people into the coffin.

The paper figure is too small, the coffin is too big, and it is difficult to find the place where the paper figure is put into the coffin, so I first used the red thread to pull it from the middle of the coffin head to the middle of the tail, and then fixed the two ends of the red thread with wooden nails.

After nailing the red line, I took the paper figure and made three strokes towards the coffin, put the paper figure in the middle of the red line, and let the paper man find a place in the coffin by himself.

I don't know what's going on, but when I put the paper figure on the red line, the paper figure seemed to be glued to it, and it didn't even tend to go into the coffin.

Seeing this situation, I was stunned, and I glanced at Wang Chengcai and said, "You blow at the paper figure and try it." ”

He stood up tremblingly, didn't dare to speak, and blew at the paper man, who shook twice on the red rope, still sticking there.

Now, we all found that the situation is a little wrong, logically speaking, the red rope is very thin, not to mention putting a paper figure, that is, putting something sticky on it, as long as you blow a breath, it will definitely fall into the coffin.

"Brother Jiu, what should I do? Or just rip it off and put it in a coffin? Guo Fatzi glanced at the paper figure and said.

"Nonsense, how can you do this, the paper man refuses to enter the coffin, which means that the deceased has no wishes." I scolded him.

That's right, the problem is, I just wrote the name of the deceased and the birth date on the paper man, and I didn't invite the deceased to the paper man, to put it bluntly, this paper man is a paper man, just a substitute, and it has nothing to do with the deceased, but now the paper man behaves as if the deceased is attached to it.

Thinking of this, I said to Wang Chengcai, "Uncle, do you want to think about the deceased's wishes before his death?" ”

He was stunned for a moment, and then said: "Before the old mother died, in addition to eating and drinking Lazar in bed every day, she still ate and drank Lasa, and she rarely even spoke, how can we know what her wishes are." ”

"She doesn't usually speak?" I was shocked and asked.

He nodded and said, "It's just that when she and pee, she will open her mouth and shout, and the rest of the time, the old mother is in a daze in bed." ”

As soon as I heard this, I had some doubts in my heart, according to normal reasoning, an old man who has been sick in bed for many years should be very eager to chat with future generations, talk about some things when she was young, or say her wishes, etc., which is in line with the character of the old man.

"Did the deceased talk to you?" I asked Wang Xi, who was kneeling at the table of the Eight Immortals.

They shook their heads and said that the deceased had rarely spoken to them during his lifetime, and that he had not even had the most basic conversation.