"Good at dancing and long sleeves, good at wealth" is a famous saying in the Warring States period. From one aspect, it shows that China is a big silk country, and it also proves that the dance featuring long sleeves has already spread in China. There is a lot of evidence of long-sleeved dancing in Han Dynasty. For example, there is a dancer who is good at dancing with long sleeves on the Han Dynasty stone relief in Nanyang Shiqiao, Henan Province. She put one hand on the floor, one hand dragged on the floor, and one leg raised, as if doing a sideways jump. The dance is unrestrained and beautiful. Similar images have certain typical significance in Han portraits. Of course, long-sleeved dance is a musical dance developed due to the characteristics of clothing, while the hem of women's dresses in Han Dynasty is wide and long, and sometimes it is necessary to strengthen the dance momentum through the movement of hand sleeves. A Han stone relief in Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province just illustrates this point.
It is worth noting that such a moving performance is sometimes decorated with exquisite curtains in quite open areas and sometimes indoors. More importantly, the long-sleeved dance performance is with the band. There may be more or fewer musicians, and sometimes only one person can be seen on the screen. For example, the above picture of a Han dynasty stone, playing the flute, is very devoted. The musical instruments that accompany the long-sleeved dance are Xiao, Drum, Fu, Sheng, Lian and cymbals. In many cases, singers accompany the dancers.