Glasses in the Ming and Qing dynasties are considered valuable items, some glasses with tortoiseshell as the frame in the eyeglass mart, the Qing Dynasty “All men bamboo Ci” has “glasses set with tortoiseshell edge” (” Qing Dynasty Beijing bamboo Ci “) sentence. In ancient times, the hawksbill turtle was a symbol of luxury and auspice. A Tang Dynasty poet wrote in his poem “Not seeing Alone” : “The young woman of the Lu family was in the golden hall, and the petrel was in the hawksbill beam.” Tortoiseshell is used to create a rich and luxurious atmosphere.
Glasses became a popular item in the Qing Dynasty, but they were not affordable for ordinary people. There are two references to glasses in A Dream of Red Mansions, both of which are used by Jia Mu, the highest ranking member of the Jia family. “A Dream of Red Mansions” fifty-three times described Jia mother in the big flower hall to watch the play, Jia mother sat on the couch, “on the couch and set a very light lacquer painted gold small table, several placed tea hanging, tea bowl, gargle, towel, and so on, there is a glasses case.” Jia mother slanted on the couch, joking with everyone once, and took off her glasses to take a picture on the stage once.” Fang Hao’s “The Background of the story of Western objects recorded in the Dream of the Red Chamber” argues that Jia Mother used “glasses”, or telescopes, to observe the distance. But another description in “A Dream of Red Mansions” is almost certainly glasses. Ninety-five times in the description of Jia Mu looking at jade, also mentioned the details of wearing glasses: “Jia Mu opened the look, I saw that the jade was darker than before.” While rubbing, the Mandarin duck took his glasses, looked at them, and said: “Strange, this jade is, how can the precious color in the head be lost?” ‘”
Ye Mengzhu of the Qing Dynasty described in detail the changes in the price of glasses at that time in the “Reading the World” : “Glasses, when I was young, I occasionally saw the use of high years, I do not know its price, after the system from the Western people are the best, each pair of value silver four, fifty-two, with glass as the quality, elephant skin as dry, not a big force can not be caused.” After Shunzhi, its price became cheap, and each pair of silver was only five or six dollars. Recently, Suzhou and Hangzhou people made more, sold everywhere, everyone can get, each pair of silver value of the most expensive but seven, eight, even four, five points, there are two, three a pair, are worthy of eyesight, general use. But in the West, there is a texture thicker than skin, which can make the short-sighted person clear, each pair is still worth a silver price of 22, if the far-sighted and the elderly take it, it is not clear, there is not yet a seller in the city, and it is afraid that in a few years, the skillful work here is also versatile, and the price is low.” It can be seen that the price of glasses was very high at the beginning, and not ordinary people could use them, but later, as the proportion of glasses made in China increased, the price also fell, and glasses entered the homes of ordinary people.
