明清时期以太湖为中心的江南地区,存在着大量的古墓名坟、家族祠墓和数量不可胜计的义冢群。其中,义冢虽一开始由政府颁定地方广泛设置,但在后世大多荒废,而绅商富室主持的慈善组织,维系着大量义冢,却弥补了官方能力的不足,给当时江南的城乡地区提供了许多公共墓地,并以义举的形式,常年维护着地方环境卫生。在这个过程中,火葬自始至终存在。由于江南土地珍稀,下层民众贫乏无力的,多从火化,从而官绅倡导的土葬与民间盛行的火化,时常产生冲突。官方的屡次示禁,既体现了以维护儒家伦理道德一方的不满,也深刻说明了火化习俗的长久顽固性。在江南地区,火化是有地区差异的,一般是山乡少、水乡多;城区少、乡村多。此外,还有浮厝或停棺不葬,对环境卫生显然不利,也遭官方的经常性禁革。从整个明清时期来看,坟茔义冢的存续和意义,发生了许多变化。一个主要变化是,卫生意识也被纳入了官绅提倡土葬的理论中;另一个重要变化,则是同治以后,由于咸丰太平之乱造成了城乡无主荒山、荒地的大量存在,给官方提倡土葬,在每乡每圩建设义冢,提供了难得的契机,也为消弭火化之风创造了条件。 The Ming and Qing Dynasties Taihu Lake as the center of the southern region, there are a large number of ancient cemetery tombs, family shrine and the number of invincible graves. Among them, although the Yizu was initially set up by the government and widely set in local places, most of the later generations were deserted while charitable organizations led by the gentry-merchants rich room maintained a large number of fiefs but made up for the lack of official capabilities, The area provides many public cemeteries and, in the form of righteous acts, maintains local sanitation throughout the year. In the process, cremation came from beginning to end. Due to the rare land in the south of Yangtze River and the low and weak people in the lower ranks, cremation has been the most common. Therefore, conflicts often occur between the burial ground advocated by the gentry and popular cremation in the folk. Official repeated demonstrations not only embody the dissatisfaction of the party maintaining Confucian ethics, but also profoundly demonstrate the persistent intransigence of cremation practices. In Jiangnan area, there are regional differences in cremation. Generally, there are few townships and more water towns. There are fewer urban areas and more villages. In addition, floating house or coffin is not buried, the environmental health is obviously adverse, but also by the official regular ban on the revolution. Throughout the Ming and Qing Dynasties, many changes have taken place in the existence and significance of tomb mounds. A major change is that the health awareness has also been incorporated into the theory of gentry advocating burial; another important change is that after the Tongzhi rule, due to the peace and disorder in Xianfeng, there were a large number of barren hills and wasteland in urban and rural areas, The construction of the mounds of graves in each township of each commune provided a rare opportunity and created the conditions for eliminating the cremation wind.