A, Yangzhou's cultural heritage:

1, the Maritime Silk Road

Yangzhou's unique geographic location, Yangzhou in the Tang Dynasty, relying on the canal, bordering the Yangtze River, facing the sea, is the distribution of materials from the north and south, the "land Silk Road" and "Maritime Silk Road" intersection, the melting pot of diverse cultures and "rich" international trade center. It was a distribution center for materials from the north and south, a meeting point of the "Land Silk Road" and the "Sea Silk Road", a melting pot of diversified cultures, and an international trade center of the "world's richest".

2. China Grand Canal (Yangzhou Section of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal)

Yangzhou is the birthplace of the Grand Canal, and is the lead city of China's Grand Canal Heritage Bid, joining forces with 34 cities along the route to make the bid over eight years of effort. In June 2014, the Grand Canal of China was inscribed on the World Heritage List, becoming China's 46th World Heritage project.

Ten sites and six sections of the river in Yangzhou are now listed as world heritage sites, which is the largest number and most comprehensive among the cities along the China Grand Canal.

Second, Yangzhou wedding customs:

Engagement: Yangzhou custom called engagement "under the tea". Engagement is also known as "betrothal". There is a big set, small set of points. Small fixed, also known as "stable pro", is still young in the case of men and women in the form of betrothal. Big fixation is the formal betrothal. Now free love, as long as the two sides to talk about the final, the man invited the woman's parents to the door of the feast, it is considered to be betrothed.

Marriage: marriage to choose the "lucky day", the old time to choose the auspicious day of the Zodiac, now choose the day in the lunar calendar in the double (especially six, do not choose fourteen), or "May Day", National Day, New Year's Day, these legal holidays.

The day before the wedding, the groom's brothers and others went to the woman's home to send a dowry (dowry). When they arrive at the woman's house, they have to eat three courses of tea (sweet tea, clear tea, and snacks) before handing out the dowry. The toilet and foot basin in the pavement are picked by the groom's brother.

The toilet (now changed to a spittoon) is placed inside the five children: descendants of the egg (red eggs), red dates, dyed red and green fruits, lotus seeds, peanuts, symbolizing the "five sons to success".

Inside the box, in addition to clothes, there are also: filial shoes for the in-laws, new shoes for the husband and brother-in-law, handkerchiefs for the aunts, and "puppy shoes" for the future child.

The bride's uncle or brother carries the bride to the sedan chair. After the bridge is lifted and turned around three times in front of the door, the woman's family pours water on the palanquin (signaling that the bride should not stay in her mother's house any longer) and spreads chopsticks (wishing the bride to give birth to a son soon). The sedan chair turns around, and the bride's older or younger brother follows the bride. After sending relatives to the door and the bride out of the sedan chair, you have to sit down and eat three courses of tea.

Three local dialects:

Yangzhou dialect is the representative dialect of the Jianghuai official dialect, which has existed for at least three or four hundred years. It used to be the official language during the Ming Dynasty, and there are still a lot of ancient Chinese vocabulary, as well as some vivid and interesting spoken words. The operas that use the Yangzhou dialect as a carrier include Yangzhou Qingqu, Yangzhou commentary, Yangzhou opera, and so on. These operas have been listed as national intangible cultural heritages.

Extended information:

Population and Ethnic Composition of Yangzhou:

The first time that there was a complete record of the population of Yangzhou within its boundaries was in the second year of the Western Han Dynasty, 2 A.D. (Yuan Shi) ), when the population of the county led by the state of Guangling amounted to 140,000, dropping to 45,000 by the eighth year (464) of Daming in the Southern Song Dynasty of the Northern and Southern Dynasties. Between Tianbao and Zhenyuan of the Tang Dynasty, the population of Yangzhou Prefecture amounted to 470,000, and then dropped to 100,000 during the Chongning period of the Song Dynasty, leaving only 63,000 people in the Daguan period of the Song Dynasty.

In the first half of the Yuan Dynasty (1290), the population of Yangzhou was 980,000, with eight counties. At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, the population of Yangzhou County declined drastically due to the war. In the ninth year of the Ming Dynasty (1376), the population was 570,000, and in the twenty-sixth year of the Hongwu Dynasty (1393), Yangzhou Prefecture had a population of 740,000, with 10 counties.

The wars of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, such as the "Ten Days of Yangzhou", made the population of Yangzhou decline again, and in 1728 (Yongzheng six years) Yangzhou Prefecture led seven counties, with only 250,000 people.

Since then, the Qing dynasty implemented a series of policies favorable to the development of the population, so that the population soared, the population exceeded 2 million in 1772 (Qianlong 37 years), and exceeded 3 million in 1808 (Jiaqing 13 years), and then due to the wars and disasters, the population declined again.

In the early 19th century, there were 10 cities with more than 500,000 inhabitants in the world, and six in China, namely Beijing, Jiangning (present-day Nanjing), Yangzhou, Suzhou, Hangzhou and Guangzhou.?

According to the "Main Data of the Sixth National Population Census of Yangzhou City in 2010", as of 00:00 on November 1, 2010, the resident population of Yangzhou City was 4,459,760, and compared with 4,672,684 as of 00:00 on November 1, 2000 of the Fifth National Population Census, the number of ten years*** decreased by 2,129,924, or 4.56%, with an average annual growth rate of - 0.47%.

The city's resident population, 1402,969 family households, family household population of 4206,652 people, an average of 3 people per family household, than the fifth national census in 2000, 3.1 people, a decrease of 0.1 people.?

As of the end of 2017, the resident population of Yangzhou City was 4,508,200, and the urbanization rate of the resident population was 66.05%, an increase of 1.65 percentage points from 2016.

As of the end of 2017, Yangzhou had a total household population of 4,599,800, 16,851 fewer than at the end of 2016. The city registered 45,400 births, with a birth rate of 9.87 per thousand; 52,800 deaths, with a death rate of 11.48 per thousand. The natural population growth rate was -1.61‰. As of the end of 2017, the total household population of Yangzhou urban area was 2,330,000, an increase of 0.23%.

The Han nationality accounts for more than 99% of the total population.

There are Mongolian, Hui, Tibetan, Uyghur, Miao, Yi, Zhuang, Buyi, Korean, Manchu, Dong, Yao, Bai, Tujia, Hani, Dai, Li, She, Kazakh, Russian, Oroqen, Gaoshan, Shui, Naxi, Tu, Salar, Gelao, Sibe, Achang, Qiang, Tajik, and Jing ethnic minorities distribution.

The total population of minority nationalities is more than 20,000, accounting for 0.6% of the city's total population. Lingtang Hui Township under Gaoyou is the only ethnic township in Jiangsu Province.

Baidu Encyclopedia-Yangzhou