Ancestral village protocols and burial conventions

[chimex64]

If you would indulge me.

1) I know am close to certain My GF's Mom was a 伍 and that she her husband died at end or right after WW2. My question. If they are living in a 李 village, would both be buried there?

2) On expectations: I have this romantic image of building that houses an ancient book, chronologically organized in which my GF's name will pop out and then the names of his parents and a long string of male names. is this what I should expect to find?

3) On protocol. With a list of villages, what is the protocol? I stroll in village, who and what do I ask for? What are the dos and don'ts?

4) on the 伍 family history. Right now I only have a possible candidate for the given name: Lu Chi. Would I see in this book a family tree with 伍 Lu Chi in the book?  And what of finding her parents?  Would this book say on ABC date 李 Ket Chan (the romanized spelling of the primary candidate) married 伍 Lu Chi whose parents are XXXX and YYYY and who came from XYZ village? 

Thank you, I am getting ahead of myself. But it took 15 years just to feel confident about  伍. 

[andytan]

If your girlfriend's mother was married to someone from the 李氏 and was living in a 李氏 village, then I believe she would have been buried there or at least for my family that was the case back then.

As for finding the village, I believe the administration office in charge of the villages would have the information, then I believe you speak to the village chief about whatever it is that you're looking for.

If your girlfriend's mother was an 伍氏, then it's very unlikely that you'd be able to find her in the 伍氏族譜, because the 氏族譜 usually contain the names of the male paternal ancestors.

[jasonwu]

Hi chimex64,

1) After a woman's marriage, she is no longer considered a part of her maiden clan. As such, she would most likely be buried with her husband's family and have her husband's village inscribed on her headstone (if any, since rural burials do not always use headstones). Please note that burials may not always occur within the village, Chinese people used to use feng shui to find ideal places for burial and this was not always near their place of residence. More recently, rural governments have designated areas where multiple villages may bury the ashes of their deceased (cremation has been strictly enforced in recent decades).

2) If you are doing fieldwork in a village, first announce the reason why you are visiting and where you are visiting from; "I believe my grandfather might have hailed from this village, my family now lives in Toronto." Then, provide them with as many names of relatives as you possibly can; the more recent, the better. Most villages are communities of people who are descended from one patrilineal ancestor so some of the villagers might recognize the names in your family and/or know which households from the village have immigrated to your place of residence. It might also be wise to locate the local rural government office and let them know of your situation; they can put you in contact with the village representative aka the "village chief". However, your "village" of interest, 南村 Nam Chuen, is actually a collection of villages. You will need to find the name of the village within Nancun - villages are usually recorded on headstones and in ship manifests of Chinese immigrants (you can use www.familysearch.org/search/ to search for these).

3) As Andy has mentioned, it's very, very rare that a daughter will be listed in the family history/family trees/genealogical records/"族譜 zupu" of her maiden clan, especially in Taishanese records (I have seen some records in Chungshan, Sunwui, Poonyu where daughters and their husbands are listed). In recent years, with the one-child policy, it's become a little more common for daughters to be listed in their maiden clan's zupu. As well, generally, marriage dates are not recorded in zupu; however, birth and death dates of male offspring and their wives are sometimes recorded. You will probably need the name of your great-grandmother's father in order to trace her lineage in her 伍 Ng/Wu zupu. My guess, considering the location of 南村 Nam Chuen, is that your great-grandmother was from one of the villages in 上坪 Sheung Ping/下坪 Har Ping (villagedb.friendsofroots.org/display.cgi/heung/45) or 五十 Ng Sup (villagedb.friendsofroots.org/display.cgi/heung/81#h140). 

The families trees of the 南村 Nam Chuen branch of the 李 Li/Lee clan can be found in the 2018 Taishan Li Genealogy 台山李氏族譜, Volume 3, Pages 325-710; available from MyChinaRoots.org: (click here). There is a search bar where you can input the Chinese names of your relatives; however, the book may have typos and/or the OCR text in the images might not be accurate, so you may need to try multiple names or skim through the pages to find your family's tree.

-Jason