China was the only country that practised foot-binding ,a custom that shocked people from other countries. In some countries of the world, people made tattoas or bore holes in their nose as symbols of totem or beauty which did no great harm to their health. However, with foot-binding, a woman was factually handicapped and could never walk properly again for the rest of her life.

Historically, foot-binding began in the Southern Tang period (937-975) as an outgrowth of the practice of wrapping the feet of dancers with ribbons.

Actually, the practice of foot-binding did not become popular until after the Song Dynasty (960-1279) when women's status further deteriorated under the influence of the feudal ethics advocated by the Neo-Confucian thinkers. Women became the playthings of men and their property, one of whose roles in life was to please men. Ecentric as it is, foot-binding was not for all women,especially during the first few centuries after it came into being. A Ming Dynasty (1308-1644 ) decree enacted for the lowly stated that "No boy is allowed to go to school and no girl may have her feet bound." By the Qing times (1644-1911), the practice had become widespread not only among the Chinese gentry class but also among common people, who pursued the social status foot-binding implied. Even the Manchus followed the fashion by wearing shoes with small attachments on the bottorn of them, making them to appear like those for bound feet.

A prevailing thought was that a woman with natural feet had no chance to marry well. Thus, more girls continued to had their fee bund and, in some provinces in North China, the practice was forced to 2-to-3-year-old girls. Their feet were less than three inches when they grew up.Girls of rich families usually began to suffer the painful experience of foot-binding at the age of four or five, and in some special cases, girls as young as two years old were included. The motber, who herself had bound feet, insisted on binding the feet of her daughter, bee:ause she knew that small feet could bring her daughter a decent marriage and a good life. So the more a mother loved her daughter, the tighter she bund her feet.

The first nationwide and powerful anti-foot-binding movement emerged in the year of 1854, This uprising swept across half of China and the peasant regime lasted for 10 years. This movement was soon revived in a few years time. In 1870s, western missionaries began to help fight against foot-binding. To Christians, foot-binding run counter to religious doctrine, because they believed that everyone was equal before God. They said both men and womem were created with a pair of feet, but foot-binding went gainst the heavenly principle, denied God's bestowing and was contrary to destiny. Of course, those Christian articles also concerned about the fact that women with bund feet could not walk far to go to church.

The Revolution led by Sun Yat-sen in 1911 brought a new awakening to Chinese women fighting for their liberation, including abolition of foot-binding.

The Chinese Gommunist Party spared no effort to promote the cause of women's liberation, and strongly advocated gender equality, resolutely opposed foot-binding and did a lot of concrete work in this regard during the new democratic revolution from May, 1919 to October,1949. With the founding of the People's Republic of China. the feudal society and its ethical code completely collapsed, and foot-binding has been rooted out. Women are protected by state law to enjoy equal rights with men in every major aspect of social life, and they have left their past narrow and small world and are 1ow playing a dstinctive role with their male counterparts in promoting the social development.