Alas, the heavy clothes of the Japanese ministers and nobles in the Heian period were really a headache for modern people who admired simplicity.

However, fortunately, the labor cost was very cheap in those years, and there was a large group of maids and servants in each minister's house. So, most of you young masters and ladies don't have to do it yourself, as long as you poke it there like a real Japanese doll, there will be a group of maids and servants running around you, helping you get dressed, wash your hair, and comb your bun...... If you're good at it, you might be able to take advantage of this break to take a nap.

But the problem is, you have to dress up after you're dressed - that's pretty damning.

First of all, the ancient Oriental people, regardless of gender, were accustomed to growing long hair. Modern women can maintain long hair and waist, which is already very powerful. And the hair of aristocratic women in the Heian period was on average more than 3 meters! As for the highest record in this regard, it comes from Emperor Murakami's favorite concubine, Yoshiko, who is recorded to have hair about 7 meters long...... And the latest holder of today's Guinness Book of Hair Length Records, Comrade Xie Qiuping of China, has a hair length of only 5.62 meters.

Obviously, such a long hair, whether it is combing, drying or daily maintenance, is a tedious and vast project. Fortunately, the work of grooming and weaving hair is usually done by maids, and the nobles themselves do not find it hard.

The real problem lies in the next facial makeup.

-- According to the decadent habits of sissy that he learned from the Jiangnan scholars in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the male ministers and nobles of the Heian period in Japan also had to apply grease and powder, paint their thrushes and dye their teeth like women, and spend several hours a day carefully dressing up and dressing up.

Among them, the "thrush" of the ancient Japanese minister is completely different from the modern concept, which is to pluck out all the eyebrows, and then use ink to dot the silkworm eyebrows between the eyebrows and forehead, which feels very similar to the face mask in Peking Opera. In the eyes of modern people, it is estimated that it will feel ugly, but it will not harm your health.

(But the strange thing is that most of the actors who play the princesses in Japanese period dramas don't seem to have shaved their eyebrows!) It's really disrespectful! )

Can be followed by whitening. Powder, there is a life-threatening danger!

The so-called whitening. Powder is a white powder that is used to evenly apply makeup to the face with a soft brush to whiten it, just like the Japanese geisha and kabuki in later generations. The white used at the time. Powder, the main material is rice flour, lead white (lead powder) and light powder (mercury powder). Rice flour is the cheapest and healthiest of these, but its color is not as pure as mineral flour. Therefore, those qualified ministers and nobles all choose the latter two, which are more expensive.

In the same era, the women of the Chinese court were basically using lead powder for beauty, which is the so-called "washing away the lead flower"!

But the Japanese ministers at that time probably didn't think that lead powder and mercury powder were highly toxic!!

Long before the arrival of the Heian period in Japan, the ancient Romans in the West had suffered enough from lead poisoning.

As a result of the long-term use of lead powder cosmetics, lead wine glasses and plates, and even lead pipes on elevated canals, Caesar and Pompey's descendants all suffered from chronic lead poisoning. From the latter part of the Roman Empire onwards, Roman citizens gradually became weak, mentally retarded, had a shrinking fertility rate, and had more deformed children...... This became a major incentive to eventually lead to the destruction of the empire!

After entering the modern era, due to the common use of lead bullets in early muskets, after every battle, many soldiers were slowly tortured to death by the incurable lead poisoning at that time because a lead bullet could not be taken out of the body, or was taken out too late.

-- The end result of long-term use of lead white on the face can also lead to chronic lead poisoning, anemia, vomiting, nerve paralysis and other symptoms. And. If aristocratic women reach the age of childbearing and continue to use lead white makeup during pregnancy and breastfeeding, it will also lead to anemia, indigestion, and even brain imperfection in the baby. In case of inadvertently allowing the baby to directly ingest lead poison during breastfeeding, due to the incomplete development of the baby's body and the poor detoxification ability of the internal organs, it is even likely to directly lead to sudden death! …,

As for the toxicity of mercury, it is also very terrifying - mercury poisoning usually acts directly on the nerves of the person, and the poisoner first suddenly becomes impatient and violent, and then becomes demented and forgetful, and Zuihou cannot take care of himself in life, and even his movement is affected. The specific symptom of the late stage of mercury poisoning is total paralysis, somewhat similar to the disease of our modern Mr. Hawking, the author of "A Brief History of Time", who can only move three fingers.

Therefore, I would like to warn all men and women who are preparing to travel back to the Heian period, for the sake of your own life and the health of your children and grandchildren, even if others ridicule your family as a miser, you must rub your face with the cheapest rice noodles, and do not play with lead white and mercury powder!

(In the Heian era, the productivity was backward, and some lower-level ministers applied rice flour to their faces, and when they got to the back, they were almost all lead white, which was even more sad.) ）

Of course, in order to avoid sleeping with a poison every day, and then let this poison and you give birth to the next generation of drug cubs, so when choosing a marriage partner, it is best to find someone with a relatively low family background and a relatively poor family, in short, it is the kind of broken household that can't afford to use lead white!

So, for the sake of your health, you insisted on smearing your face with the cheapest rice noodles despite the ridicule and contempt of the maids (who joked that you were a stingy ghost). Then, the maids take out the saffron dye and apply it to your lips, cheeks, and nails, which is almost the equivalent of lipstick, blush, and nail polish in later generations—it's basically a natural, non-polluting green product.

The problem is that the next makeup step "Black Teeth" will make people suffer again!

-- In order to better bring out the whiteness of the skin, the nobles of the Heian period, regardless of gender, used black teeth as beautiful. After the coming-of-age ceremony, both girls and boys have their teeth dyed black to signify their marriage.

To do this, they apply a black dye called "iron paste" to their own teeth, at least the front teeth.

- Ladies and gentlemen looking for romance, please take note! In the anime works set in the Heian period in Japan, those handsome noblemen who smile and show six white teeth, as well as the famous lady with crooked eyebrows and bright eyes and bright teeth, are actually all non-existent!

And what is this "iron pulp" unique to the ancient Japanese? Specifically, it is a viscous liquid made by mixing tea, wine, vinegar and other liquids, adding rusty crushed iron filings, then sealing and fermenting like sake brewing, and heating and boiling zuihou.

It is said that this "iron slurry" smells foul, is mildly toxic, and can seriously damage the gums, and can lead to oral infections if not done well - I wonder why the Japanese in the Heian period invented this thing to torture themselves?

However, as the so-called local customs, the end of refusing to dye black teeth in that environment is to be rejected by the whole society.

-- According to records, in the Heian period, there was also a maverick aristocratic woman nicknamed "Bug Girl" (eyebrows shaped like bugs) who resolutely refused to dye her teeth black and shave her eyebrows, and as a result, she was unable to marry until she was old, leaving her parents to death. Later, I finally found a noble son who tasted curiosity (from the point of view at the time), and I barely got together as a husband and wife......

Therefore, if you really make up your mind to travel to the family of the Japanese minister in the Heian period, then it is best to seize the time to learn from the Taiwan compatriots and chew more betel nuts! Chew until your teeth are blackened! Although chewing betel nut can also cause some damage to your teeth, it is much better than the Japanese applying that "iron pulp" to what kind of rausch!