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The modern Chinese tunic suit is a style of male attire traditionally known in China as the Zhongshan suit () (after Sun Yat-Sen, otherwise Romanized as Sun Zhongshan), and later as the Mao suit (after Mao Zedong). Sun Yat-sen introduced the style shortly after the founding of the Republic of China as a form of national dress although with a distinctly political and later governmental implication. After the end of the Chinese Civil War and the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, such suits came to be worn widely by males and government leaders as a symbol of proletarian unity and an Eastern counterpart to the Western business suit. The name "Mao suit" comes from Chinese leader Mao Zedong's fondness for wearing them in public, so that the garment became closely associated with him and with Chinese communism in general in the Western imagination. Although they fell into disuse among the general public in the 1990s due to increasing Western influences, they are still commonly worn by Chinese leaders during important state ceremonies and functions.〔http://english.people.com.cn/90001/90776/90785/6775781.html〕 In the 1960s and 1970s the Mao suit became fashionable among Western European socialists and intellectuals. It was sometimes worn over a turtleneck. ==Origins== When the Republic was founded in 1912, the style of dress worn in China was based on Manchu dress (''qipao'' and ''changshan''), which had been imposed by the Qing Dynasty as a form of social control. The majority-Han Chinese revolutionaries who overthrew the Qing were fueled by failure of the Qing to defend China against western imperialists and the low standing of the Qing in terms of technology and science compared to the West. Even before the founding of the Republic, older forms of Chinese dress were becoming unpopular among the elite and led to the development of Chinese dress which combined the changshan and the Western hat to form a new dress. The Zhongshan suit is a similar development which combined Western and Eastern fashions. The Zhongshan suit was an attempt to cater to contemporary sensibilities without adopting Western styles wholesale. Dr. Sun Yat-sen was personally involved, providing inputs based on his life experience in Japan: the Japanese cadet uniform became a basis of the Zhongshan suit. There were other modifications as well: instead of the three hidden pockets in Western suits, the Zhongshan suit had four outside pockets to adhere to Chinese concepts of balance and symmetry; an inside pocket was also available. Over time, minor stylistic changes developed. The suit originally had seven buttons, later reduced to five. After repeated attempts to win support and recognition from Western countries failed, the Nationalist Party government in Canton led by Sun gained help (advisers and small arms) from Soviet Russia, which viewed it as a likely revolutionary ally against Western interests in the Far East; Chinese nationalism at the time (of treaty ports and extraterritoriality discriminations) was heavily infected with resentment against the West. As a result of this geopolitical alignment, Sun agreed to permit the nascent Chinese Communist Party to join the Nationalist Party — as individual members — not as a party-party union, combination or alliance. As a result, early Communist Party members adopted the attire as a mark of joining the Nationalist Party. Ironically, from that practice during an attenuated political marriage of convenience which would soon be divorced in blood (in 1927), Asian Marxist movements and governments henceforth would all consider this attire as a standard of political coloration, and it would continue to be appropriate dress for both sides of the bitter Chinese civil wars lasting decades. After Sun Yat-sen's death in 1925, popular mythology assigned a revolutionary and patriotic significance to the Zhongshan suit. The four pockets were said to represent the Four Virtues cited in the classic ''Guanzi'': Propriety, Justice, Honesty, and Shame. The five center-front buttons were said to represent the five Yuans (branches of government)–legislation, supervision, examination, administration and jurisdiction–cited in the constitution of the Republic of China and the three cuff-buttons to symbolize Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People: Nationalism, Democracy, and People's Livelihood. Finally, unlike Western-style suits that are usually composed of two layers of cloth, the jacket is in a single piece—symbolizing China's unity and peace. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Mao suit」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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