明清时期澳门葡裔族群婚俗探析

A Study of the Marriage Customs of Portuguese Descendants in Macao in the Ming and Qing Dynasties

明清时期澳门葡裔族群的婚俗遵循天主教原则:由神父主持、一夫一妻、婚恋自由;亦有伊比利亚半岛之风情:如女授戒指于男,男14岁始婚,不避同姓,婚礼后先回娘家等。这同当时华人风俗大相径庭,在中文文献中可见大量记载,但这些记载往往因文化误读而失实,本文结合西文史料对其严加辨析,力求得出相对客观的结论。此外,他们的婚俗亦受到中国及东南亚国家风俗文化的熏陶,沾染了东方色彩。明清之际,还出现了男嫁女家的特殊风尚。

In Macao, the Portuguese descendants' marriage customs were based on Catholic practices in the Ming and Qing dynasties, such as the wedding ceremony being conducted by a priest, monogamy, and freedom of marriage. In addition, it contained the customs of the Iberian Peninsula; for instance, the bride presenting a ring to the bridegroom, a male's marriageable age being over14, same-surname marriage being allowable, and so on. These were totally different from the Chinese customs. There are many historical records about the Portuguese descendants' marriage customs in Chinese documents, but with much cultural misreading. We have to analysis these Chinese historical records with reference to the historical material in other foreign languages. Moreover, they were also influenced by Eastern culture, such as Chinese and Malaysian customs. At the juncture of the Ming and Qing dynasties, many Chinese men married into and lived with their Portuguese brides' families.