Fèng guān凤冠(Phoenix Crown) of Chinese empresses, Qing dynasty and Ming dynasty, collected in the For
Fèng guān凤冠(Phoenix Crown) of Chinese empresses, Qing dynasty and Ming dynasty, collected in the Forbidden city, Beijing. Actually the first red crown is for high-ranked imperial concubines whose title is fēi妃, and people call them huáng fēi皇妃. The second red crown with more gold ornaments is for the empress who is the only wife of emperor by ancient law, her title is hòu后 and is always called huáng hòu皇后 by people. Huáng皇 means imperial/royal. But pay attention that the title fēi妃 also applies to the wife of prince because her status is inferior to the status of empress/huáng hòu皇后, for example, the wife of prince is called wáng fēi王妃, and if the prince is tài zǐ太子(crown prince), then his wife is tài zǐ fēi太子妃. In English the wife of prince can be called princess, same as the daughter of emperor. However in Chinese the wife of prince and the daughter of emperor don’t share the same title. Usually the daughter of emperor is considered more superior than the wife of prince in ancient China, for the latter probably doesn’t own royal blood. The daughter of emperor is called huáng nǚ皇女 which straightly means ‘imperial/royal daughter’. If she is especially in favor with the emperor or her mother is the empress, then she would be given the distinguished title gōng zhǔ公主 by emperor himself, so not every huáng nǚ皇女 can be called gōng zhǔ公主. There are even variations in the title gōng zhǔ公主, such as dà gōng zhǔ大公主(most noblest daughter of emperor), zhǎng gōng zhǔ长公主(most noblest sister of emperor), dà zhǎng gōng zhǔ大长公主(most noblest sister of the father of emperor, his aunt). -- source link
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