Endings. Death, along with birth and marriage, is recognized as one of the three major events in the course of an individual's life. In China since classical times the rites for funerals were observed with no less importance than those for birth and marriage. Mourning rites were formalized in the Zhou dynasty (771-256 B.C.E.), but they became more elaborate and were popularized, along with the development of the kinship system, in the Tang dynasty (618-907). Mourning rites exemplified differentiation and generational stratification of the kinship system, characterized by an exogamous Zhong Zu (clan organization). At funerals such generation-age hierarchy showed up in the differences of mourning costumes and in the degrees of grief one was expected to express.

Dressing. The dead were dressed according to their social status. At the ceremony of "slighter dressing" of the dead, an embroidered...