Kind · By use
Special-purpose cloths
These special-purpose bojagi wrapped funeral banners, ancestral portraits and ritual objects, and gave their name to the 보쌈 custom.
- Meaning
- 'banner wrapper', 'portrait-enshrining wrapper' and 'wrapped bundle' (명정 funeral banner, 영정봉안 enshrining a portrait, 보쌈 wrapping-up + 보)
- Made of
- Silk, cotton or hemp; not described in detail
- Era
- Joseon (1392–1910)
Encyclopedia category 특수용보: cloths for funeral banners, for enshrining portraits (palace 영정보 also survive), and 보쌈 (bundling).
History & tradition
Joseon
The encyclopedia groups these as special-purpose cloths: wrappers for the funeral name-banner (명정), cloths for enshrining ancestral or royal portraits (one palace 영정보 survives), cloths for rain rites and ritual vessels, and the 보 of 보쌈. 보쌈 was a Joseon custom of abduction in a cloth, rooted in the ban on widow remarriage: a man might carry off a widow, or a family might wrap up a stranger to spare their daughter widowhood. It lasted until the 1894 reforms allowed widows to remarry.
Today 보쌈 mostly means the dish of boiled pork wrapped in leaves; the custom survives only in stories.
Researched with medium confidence.