Brokering Death and Becoming Kin

This chapter explores a funerary relationship known as grave-relatives (墳親, fenqin ) prevalent in the Yangzi Delta during the late Qing dynasty. The practice of forming grave-relative relationships between urban dwellers and rural villagers nominally extended kin connections for the sake of acquiring burial land and caring for the ancestors. Drawing on a wide range of historical sources, including newspaper articles, local gazetteers, genealogies, diaries, letters, and memoirs, this chapter illustrates how interpersonal and interfamilial interactions between urban mourning families and rural grave-tending families underpinned the dynamics of urban-rural exchanges. By delving into the relationships between urban dwellers and their grave tenders, this chapter shows how popular funerary practices were implicated in the shifting social dynamics and power structures of the closing decades of imperial China. This analysis also extends beyond grave-relatives, considering the roles of various mortuary laborers, such as sedan chair carriers, who were integral in managing funerals and burials for urban residents. By identifying and discussing the networks formed through their collective activities, the chapter highlights the significant impacts these labor groups had on the social and economic landscapes of the late Qing Yangzi Delta. This chapter comprises three sections. The first section examines various forms of mortuary relationships, elaborating an ideal type of grave-tender implied by the urban elites. The second section centers around the rural grave-relatives’ roles as brokers involved in facilitating funeral services and securing burial land, indicating that despite social leveling demonstrated in the relationship between urban mourning families and mortuary laborers, urban wealth continued to wield specific forms of authority. The final section shifts attention to the extended kinship bonds created between urban and rural families under the title of grave-relatives, demonstrating the impact of the Taiping War on mortuary practices within the local society of the Yangzi Delta. By examining the dynamics between the urban and rural people surrounding mortuary affairs, this chapter contributes to the social history of late imperial China by emphasizing that the practice of forming grave-relative relationships was an important but neglected aspect of urban-rural interactions.