Historical allusions of great immigrants in Ming Dynasty

There is a ballad circulating in Huanghuai area: "Ask where my ancestors came from, Sophora japonica in Hongdong, Shanxi;" What's the name of the ancestral home? The old stork's nest under the big locust tree. "There are some stories about the migration of Sophora japonica in Hongtong.

According to "Geography of the Republic of China" Volume 7 "Hongtong County Records", Sophora japonica is located on the left side of Guangji Temple in the north of the city. According to the "Literature General Examination", Shanxi people moved to Beiping, Shandong, Henan and other places many times during the reign of Hongwu Yongle in the Ming Dynasty, and the meeting place was under the tree. It is rumored that Guangji Temple has set up a bureau to station personnel and sent photos and Sichuan funds. Usually after the autumn harvest, in order to accumulate more expenses for settling down. In the rustling autumn wind, the leaves are falling, and the nest of the old stork is more eye-catching. Immigrants drag their children on the road, and it is difficult to give up their homeland. They can't help looking back again and again to take a look at their hometown. The road is far away, and the cottage can't be seen. Only the towering locust trees and the old stork nests scattered on the trees came into view. Thus, this big pagoda tree and the old stork nest became the symbols of hometown.

Local chronicles, genealogy, tombstones and oral inheritance are mostly from Hongtong County in general, and some are specific to a certain village, such as taoyuan village, Dashuixiang, Wotuan Village, Laowu Village, Shuanglong Street, Dongmenli, Shuangshi Hutong and so on. There are also many immigrant villages in Hongdong, Shandong Province, which belong to other counties besides Hongdong. At the end of Qing Dynasty, there was an official named Jing Daqi in Cao Zhou (now Heze). The local natives heard that he was from Hongdong, and it was very affectionate like a distant daughter meeting her family. Someone even showed him the genealogy, saying that his ancestors were also from Hongdong. Jing Daqi was very moved, so he consulted with Liu Zilin, another Hongdong official in Shandong Province, to raise funds to repair the ancient Huai ruins. This proposal has been supported by many people in Hongdong. So, a tablet pavilion and a memorial archway were built next to the locust tree. There are four ancient poems engraved on both sides of the memorial archway, one of which is a cloud:

Recalling the touching past, I walked through a cloud window with a cane and smoked in the evening. Jia Mu helped to commemorate it, but the pagoda still stands.

Jing Daqi and others also edited a book "Records of Ancient Sophora japonica in Hongdong, Shanxi". Since the 1980s, with the rise of "root-seeking fever" at home and abroad, Hongdong immigrants have become the focus of people's attention, and the number of research works on Hongdong immigrants is also considerable. According to the descendants after immigration, they have two characteristics: "When walking, their hands are copied by their backs and their little toes are two." Walking with your hands behind your back is because it has become a habit to tie your hands behind your back for many years. There are two little toenails, which means that there is a vertical stripe on the little toenail cover of the foot, which looks like two nails at first glance.

"Who is the ancient locust who moved here? Take off your little toe and check your armor. " . Only Hongdong immigrants have this feature. A more popular legend says that officers and men are afraid of running away during immigration, so they are told to take off their shoes and cut a knife on each little toe as a sign. The folks also said that after emigrating to various places, they can occupy land at will, because the local area is deserted. Some "gallop in circles", riding a horse and running around, and wherever the horseshoe goes, it is his land; Some "plough the land", and plough it once if you are optimistic about which land, and so on.

Some of these folk stories reflect the truth of history, while others are nonsense. When people living in Jiaolai Plain die, their families have to hold a ceremony to send their souls back to their hometown in Yunnan, which is called "sending travelling expenses".

The ceremony is: at dusk the day after death, the child dragged the "funeral stick", and relatives and friends carried a car, a horse and a boy made of paper, carrying a lot of paper money, crying all the way to the "land temple" at the east end of the village. The eldest son (or grandson) is holding a sorghum stalk with a piece of paper money at the top and dragging the other end around the "land temple". When you feel that sorghum stalks are heavy, you are dragging your soul. Put the sorghum stalk (that is, the "soul") on the back and put it on the chair. There is a sacrificial table in front of the chair with sacrifices on it. This is to invite the "soul" to have a meal so that you can go on your way. After a while, I estimated that the "soul" had finished eating, so I put it on a paper cart and drove the horse well. The boy is a driver. The family warned the boy: "Don't leave the middle of the car when eating, and don't wait for dark in the hotel." Then, burn cars, horses, boys and a lot of paper money-this is money for the "soul". In the firelight, the eldest son stood on the stool and stamped his feet and shouted, "Dad, Dad (Mom called' Niang' dead), make way for the southwest, and be careful with your money!" Call "directions" three times in a row-point out the way back to my hometown in Yunnan.