1980s.
Cape Naxi in goatskin lined with fur.
Length 71 cm (28″) . Shoulder width: 87 cm (34″).
Original handcrafted clothing in very good condition.
The Naxi (or Nakhi) are an ethnic group in southern China (Yunnan Province). The cape is worn by women.
This is the most characteristic element of the Naxi women’s costume. Made of sheepskin, it is decorated with seven circular motifs representing the stars of the Big Dipper. Black and white are its main colors, white symbolizing the sky and black the earth. All these symbols – the sky, the earth and the stars – evoke the application to work of Naxi women.
The northern Naxi are known to be a matriarchal society, that is, the parentage is done by the mother and all children, men and women live in the mother’s house, from birth until their death. Their family system is different from that which we know in the West because marriage — that is, the recognition of a union of individuals by an institution — does not exist. The practice of sex life is free between non-inbred adults: at night, the man goes to the woman with whom he would like to have a sexual relationship, the woman being free to accept or not. There can be multiple partners, both for men and for women. As a result, children do not always know their progenitor (in the strictly biological sense). Children are therefore raised by the inhabitants of the house, with maternal uncles assuming the role of the “father” as we envision in the West. This conception stems in part from one of their beliefs presenting man as rain on grass: it serves to grow what is already there. The reproductive role of the man is therefore to “water” the fetus already present in women. For the Naxi, hereditary traits are contained in the bones and transmitted by women. (Wikipedia)