andrew
There is a thing known as a ghost wedding in China, a ritual that involves a corpse or two getting married after their demise. This tradition and story is actually real.
Three people were detained for attempting to sell the corpse of a young woman so it could be used in a “ghost bride” ritual. According to CBS News, this was how the event unfolded in Northern China:
The official Xinhua News Agency reported that the main suspect, a man aged 72, said he had heard about the death of a young woman in a nearby village in Shanxi province and thought of selling the corpse to relatives of single dead men. Xinhua cited police in Ruicheng county, where calls rang unanswered Friday.
Xinhua said the main suspect and two accomplices pretended to be relatives of the woman and negotiated a sale price of $4,000 with a buyer. While they were raiding a village tomb for the body last weekend, their plot was scuttled by villagers who caught them in the act and alerted police.”
The practice reportedly extends back to centuries ago, and the reason behind the ritual is to ward off bad luck, especially with dying single. Although it isn’t something that takes place every day, it still persists in the more rural areas.
So as Death and Taxes points out, the young man who is in desperate need of a partner before bad luck sets in might still be able to find a corpse bride because there is no time limit on the ghost marriage. The question is, would there be any volunteers?
