Beijing Opera Finery was primitively formed in Qing Dynasty, whose specification and style were inherited from the finery of Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). By absorbing the typical style of former finery, the Beijing Opera finery makes other progresses on design and practicability, following the principle of �all for excellent performance�. Well the Beijing Opera of Qing Dynasty has its own specified costume.
For the costumes, there are major five categories, including Mang (or Mang Robe, which is only for emperor, king, general, senior official, or queen, imperial concubine, lady, female general to wear in formal occasion); Kao (or loricae, for both male and female general in the war occasion); Zhe (or Zhezi, the most frequently used costume: deep v neck, long front, broad sleeves, to the feet length, which is fit for all characters to ware); Pei (or dress smock, deep v neck, double-breasted, broad sleeves, fitting for both male and female characters), Yi (generally it refers to all the other costumes in the Beijing Opera). For example, the one who wears yellow long robe with embroidered dragons design, and a emperor hat is the emperor; who is in blue or cyan long suit, and a piece of square black cloth is a Sheng (male character). So it is not hard to identify different characters in the play by different costumes.
It�s a good way to make audients clear who the character is by what they wear. Say, it is a strict rule for emperor role to wear a specified hat. Thought there are great changes for Chinese costumes, the change of the Beijing Opera costumes is limited to some fixed style, for it is decided by the performing condition and feature of Beijing Opera when it was initially formed.
In the early times, the artists of Beijing Opera traveled to north and south of the country, and they didn�t have to do rehearsal before the performance no matter acting with which group or person, but they only had to abide by certain rules on wearing. There are rules for different characters according to their own era, status, personality, and image, as a saying says �it's better to wear a damaged cloth rather than a wrong one�.
