Chasing corpses, this is an extremely mysterious ancient secret art, among which Xiangxi corpse chasing is the most famous. Since ancient times, China has had the feeling of returning to its roots. And those wanderers who died in other places also hoped that their souls could return to their homeland, which gave birth to the industry of chasing corpses.
Ever since its inception, attempts have been made to unravel the truth, but because the secret art is only taught between master and apprentice, there are so few people who have learned it. So much so that no one has ever figured out the truth for hundreds of years, and rumors about driving corpses have become more and more.
In ancient times, people generally believed in evil gods, and they all believed that they used some secret method to resurrect the dead and walk with the corpse chaser. However, modern people do not believe in evil, and through a series of studies, they finally came to the following two conclusions.
One theory is that the corpse is not actually walking, but rather the corpse is cut off and discarded, and then a torso is re-tied with straw to reduce the weight.
Two bamboo poles were then passed through the cuffs, and the weight was shared between the two corpse chasers on their shoulders. Since the removal of the corpses was carried out at night, passers-by could not see the clues at all from a distance. I only knew that someone was driving the corpse, and out of fear, no one dared to step forward.
When the body is transported back to its homeland, a series of burial procedures are all handled by the corpse chaser, and the family can only stand aside**, and cannot touch the body of the deceased with their own hands. And under the cover of the corpse chaser, they naturally would not have discovered that the torso of the deceased was replaced with straw.
And the second statement shows the wisdom of the ancients. This is because the corpse begins to stiffen after death, and after about twenty-four hours, it begins to subside again, gradually returning to a soft state, and then stiffening again.
The corpse chasers took advantage of this opportunity and completed the most important step in their work.
The corpse chaser would lift the deceased's arm while the body was soft, and put the bamboo pole parallel to the arm through the cuff, and finally tie the bamboo pole to the arm. When the mortis reappears, the body of the deceased is firmly fixed to the bamboo pole. The corpse chaser only needs to lift the bamboo pole to achieve the purpose of carrying the deceased forward.
The removal of the corpse is usually done by two or three people, and it will be easier for two people to carry the corpse, and if it is three people, they can also take turns to rest in the middle.
If the corpse chaser really mastered some kind of secret art to make corpses walk, only one person would be enough, and there was no need for so many people to act together. Therefore, it is widely believed that the exorcism is a kind of trick.
Because there are too few people who have mastered this skill, and in order to save their jobs, they cast a veil of mystery over the corpses. For example, only at night, or ringing bells during the process of driving out corpses, etc., are all to remind the surrounding passers-by that the corpses are being driven here, so as to encourage them to leave as soon as possible in fear.
As long as no one finds the clues, then the corpse expulsion technique can remain mysterious, and more and more people are willing to spend money to ask them to drive out the corpse and help them bring back their relatives who died in a foreign country.
But corpse removal is more than just transporting corpses, they also need to make sure that the corpses do not decay and deteriorate during long distances, and that there is no other damage. This has extremely strict requirements for the embalming skills and leg skills of the corpse chaser. In addition, the corpse chaser must also have a clear sense of direction, and be able to accurately discern the direction when rushing at night when he can't see his fingers.
In addition to these, there are also a lot of secrets in the industry, and only those who are all satisfied will have the opportunity to contact the industry of chasing corpses.
The reason why there is an industry of chasing corpses is inextricably linked with the idea of returning to the roots of fallen leaves in people's hearts. In ancient times, transportation was extremely monotonous, with only two options: horse-drawn carriages and ferries to transport corpses.
There is a general fear of death, and people in general are reluctant to take on the task of transporting corpses, especially for ships, which is very unlucky. If the boat capsizes in the lake, not only will the body be lost, but even your own life will have to be put into it.
Especially after several capsizing incidents, people are even more shy about it, believing that the cause of the sinking is the body. Over time, there was no more boatman willing to do the job.
The corpse chasers who took the land route were also born, among which the corpse chasers in Xiangxi were the most famous. It is less expensive to ask them to drive out the corpses, and they can also provide related services such as burial and embalming. But if the deceased died by fire, disease, or suicide, no matter how much money was paid, the corpse chaser would not do anything to drive the corpse. This is an internal rule in their industry, and it must not be broken.
Although there is no longer a need for corpse chasers, and there is a revelation of corpse chasing, the corpse chapel industry was an indispensable job at that time. It is with the corpse chaser that those who die in a foreign land can return to their hometowns. The longer a person is away from home, the more he misses his homeland.
There is still a saying that the living still have to return to their hometown, and the dead must not be adrift. Although the exorcism of corpses is extremely mysterious, in the final analysis, it is just a thought in people's hearts. As the saying goes, being alone in a foreign land is a stranger, and thinking of relatives every festive season. It is precisely with the homesickness that has been handed down from ancient times to the present that the profession of corpse chaser can be born in the long river of time.