Page 170 - A Dictionary of Chinese Symbols BIG Book

H

Hair

tou-fa

All Chinese have black hair. Shining black hair on a woman is called ‘Cloud-hair’ and is
admired as particularly beautiful, especially when the growth of hair is also strong
and luxuriant. Naturally wavy hair is found only in South China and in Taiwan, where it
is not uncommon. In any description of a beautiful woman, her hair is usually the first
thing to be mentioned. In medieval texts, we find references to people in Northern
Turkestan who had ‘yellow’ i.e. fair hair, and to slaves from the Burmese borderlands
who had curly hair.
Body hair is scant and regarded as undesirable. However, men are proud to sport a
good growth of beard, and in Chinese opera, high officials and military
dignitaries are always represented with exaggerated beards.

A lady with decorative head-dress on the way to Xi-wang-mu