Modern people’s living conditions have improved, and their heights have also increased. Young men over 1.8 meters can be seen everywhere. This also forms a sharp contrast with ancient times, showing that nutrition is really important.
Let’s first come to the Qin Dynasty at that time. The Qin Dynasty required that people who enlisted in the army should be no less than 1.8 meters tall. In addition, the soldiers in front of the Terracotta Warriors and Horses are also 1.8 meters tall, and the officers are 1.9 meters tall. This shows that the people of the Qin Dynasty were quite tall at that time, even 1.8 meters tall.
During the Qin and Han Dynasties, the average height gap between the north and the south was about 6 centimeters. At that time, the south only reached the Yangtze River Basin. After the development of the south in the Song Dynasty, the height gap between the north and the south was further widened, sometimes even 10 cm. After the Song Dynasty, the population also increased sharply and the nutritional level also dropped, so the height also shrank. The army recruitment standard at that time was over 1.77 meters.
In the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the height of adult men was 1.66 meters and the height of women was 1.56 meters. This is based on statistics from later archaeological excavations. During this period, the height of men basically did not change, but the height of women showed On the rise, a woman unearthed in Shandong reached 1.7 meters in height.
The Qing Dynasty has been in decline since the Qianlong period, and people's lives have become worse and worse. People at that time were at their lowest height and weight. There is another saying that before the Song Dynasty, people were tall and tall. At that time, the population was very small. The main food was soybeans and miscellaneous grains. The meat was mainly mutton and dog meat, and the intake of protein and calcium was relatively high.
Dairy products became popular in the Tang Dynasty, so people became fat at that time. After the Song Dynasty, the staple food became rice. The population explosion also led to food shortage. Most people could only rely on low-calorie nutrition, and people's height and weight decreased.