Chinese Religious Funeral Paperwork Entombed with the Tomb Owner

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Notes

1. Maidiquan (買地券) is a superstitious object placed in the tomb in ancient China. In the form of a land deed, it is the proof that the living bought a shelter in the underworld for the deceased. Maidiquan evolved from the land purchase contract in the Eastern Han Dynasty and spread throughout the country after the Tang and Song dynasties.

2. Zhenmuwen (鎮墓文) is written on pottery vases and other funerary objects, aiming to suppress ghosts and avoid disasters. Ancient Chinese believed that the spirits of the dead might harm the living, so there were inscriptions written on the funerary objects.

3. Yiwush (衣物疏) is buried in the coffin. It is a wooden list that mainly records clothing, quilts, cloth and other burial items.

4. Wang Guowei first proposed the ‘double evidence method’ in the New Evidence of Ancient History (1925), which means the use of ‘new materials excavated by archaeology’ and ‘existing ancient documents’ to verify each other in order to examine ancient history and culture. This is one of the most influential research methods in the field of history and archaeology. The ‘triple evidence method’ used in this paper is a more comprehensive research programme formed on the basis of the double evidence method and combined with ‘field investigation’.

5. The Yellow Turbans Uprising was a peasant revolt in the late Eastern Han Dynasty and one of the largest religious uprisings in Chinese history.

6. ‘Five Precepts’ refers to abstaining from killing, stealing, sexual misconduct, lying and intoxication; ‘Ten Virtues’ is expanded on the basis of the Five Precepts, including no killing, no stealing, no sexual misconduct, no lying, no provoking, no rude words, no flattery, no greed, no hatred, and right view.

7. Nvqing is the name of a deity of high status and great influence in ancient Chinese Taoism, who is in charge of ghost law (ghost law: Taoism discipline related to ghosts). Her name is used in Maidiquan and Zhenmuwen because of her powers.