A new look of the ancient village
2022-04-12
Yongtai village, located in Daiyun mountain area in central Fujian, is a local building integrating residence and defense based on mountain forest economy, which has a history of thousands of years. In order to protect these precious ancient buildings, the local government explored the mechanism of "Village Protection Office + Council". At the same time, combined with the construction of beautiful countryside, it explored the business forms of book bar, home stay, research base and rural maker space, so as to form a number of high-quality tourism routes and inject vitality into the rebirth of ancient houses. In March this year, the world architectural heritage conservation foundation released the "2022 World Architectural Heritage observation list", selecting 25 heritage sites from 225 around the world as support objects, including Huang's "father and son sanzhuang village" in Yongtai County, Fuzhou, Fujian Province. This means that Zhuang Zhai, a unique building, has entered the international vision and provided a new opportunity for the protection, activation and sustainable development of rural cultural heritage. Zhuang Zhai: the former splendor of the deep Tibetan mountains Yongtai village is located in Daiyun mountain area in central Fujian. It began in the Tang Dynasty and flourished in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. It is a local building integrating residence and defense based on mountain forest economy. The defense system includes blockhouse turrets and mechanisms, bamboo gun holes, horse race track, etc. Deep wells, wide drainage ditches, private schools and other buildings also reflect the residential attribute. Historically, the total number of Yongtai villages has exceeded 2000, and there are still 152 intact ones. Today, the grand occasion of that year can still be seen in the "five villages and sixteen villages" in Dazhan village, Yongtai County and the "one village and nine villages" in Xiayuan village. Yongtai village adopts the unique architectural structure of "four beams carrying wells", and its exquisite wood carvings, color paintings, gray sculptures, hanging tile walls and so on are amazing. It has the reputation of "strange structure of mountains". In Yongtai, the culture of farming and reading is deep-rooted and luxuriant. During the Southern Song Dynasty, there were seven top scholars in civil and military affairs. There are abundant existing documents recording the family style and family instructions inherited from generation to generation, mostly including respecting teachers, diligence and thrift, inspiring, unity and mutual assistance, etc. Nowadays, many stories familiar to local people are still circulating in Yongtai. Zhuang Zhai people are very honest. The owner of Jishan hall borrowed money to build Zhuang Zhai in 1905, and his descendants finally paid off in 1996; After the descendants of local people moved to other places, they still sent people back to Yongtai every year to participate in the cleaning of ancestral houses, which has been uninterrupted for 600 years; The forehead of tancuo was used to mark "I love my house", just like what people nowadays call "I love my family"... The Huang family's "father son sanzhuang village" included in the observation list this time preserved rich contract documents, recorded the process of mountain forest development in central Fujian during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, and reflected how the family, as the most grass-roots social governance unit at that time, responded to the changes of the environment through blood, geography and contractual relations, and continued to reproduce and develop. Protection: explore the unique Yongtai experience With the passage of time, many villages are few people or uninhabited. In order to protect these precious ancient buildings, Yongtai County established the ancient village Luogu village protection and Development Leading Group Office (hereinafter referred to as "Village Protection Office") in September 2015. The existing intact villages will be repaired and protected with funds allocated by the county finance. Zhang Peifen, vice chairman of Yongtai County CPPCC and director of the village insurance office, said that the county has set a strict threshold for the use of award and subsidy funds, including the need to repair first, and government subsidies can not exceed 50% of the total cost. In this way, the government will attract more with less funds and leverage social resources into cultural protection. Not only that, Yongtai County has also created the Zhuang village protection and Development Council based on the clan. As of February this year, 38 councils have been registered and established in the County Civil Affairs Bureau. Zhuang Zhai is geographically dispersed, and it is necessary to protect it well without the participation of the masses. Gradually, the enthusiasm of Yongtai people was mobilized, and people paid money and work to repair their ancestral houses. People's concept gradually changed from "proud of dismantling the village" to "proud of protecting the village". Aijing village is the ancestral home of more than 700 relatives surnamed Bao. Bao Daowen, the Party branch secretary of Aijing village, who grew up in the village, said that his father's words made him firm in his determination to repair the ancestral house: "we can't let the village culture be lost in the hands of our generation!" Bao Daowen and others rushed around to call for the establishment of the Council. Guided by government funds, led by the Council and the concerted participation of villagers, people were enthusiastic and donated a total of 4 million yuan. They also gathered and displayed old furniture and tools, and filled the hall of the village with old genealogy, bills, photos and ancient books. After years of continuous efforts, Aijing village is full of new vitality and won the UNESCO excellent award for cultural heritage protection in the Asia Pacific region in November 2018. The mechanism of "village security office + Council" has solved the problem of cultural security. The rescue protection work of Yongtai County for several years has made more than 30 villages and villages do not collapse, leak or fall. 18 have become provincial-level protection units, 5 such as jishantang and shaoanzhuang have been listed as national key cultural relics protection units, and Yongtai village has been awarded the title of "tourism destination of Chinese traditional architectural culture". Activation: develop a variety of cultural formats "The purpose of protection is regeneration." Zhang Peifen said that the minimum function of the repaired village is to reproduce the grand occasion of ancestor worship and family gatherings, but the protection of cultural heritage will not stop here. Yongtai is injecting vitality into the ancient house in combination with Rural Revitalization and beautiful rural construction. At present, Yongtai village has book bar, home stay, farmhouse entertainment, research and learning base, rural maker space and other business forms. A number of high-quality tourism routes have been formed in the county, and it is further planning to protect and utilize the village and traditional villages. After the activation and utilization of aijingzhuang, its function has been greatly extended. There are five exhibition rooms full of old objects collected by the folk custom museum; The red memory hall is jointly built by the surrounding five village branches. Among them, the theme exhibition of "listening to the party in Zhuang village" displays the deeds of revolutionaries who came out of Zhuang village; The new love book bar in Zhuang Zhai has a collection of 13000 books. In Qingshi village not far away, Bao Yong is busy in maker space. He works with a group of young people who return home to start businesses. They use local specialties to launch "courtesy under the village" cultural and creative gifts, and are ready to build an agricultural product processing plant. Shi Haonan and Xie Fangling, young couples who graduated from design, rented the ancient Qing Dynasty house Li Zhaoju in Songkou town and transformed it into a multi-functional fashion space. Their design studio is also located here. Xie Fangling said that ancient buildings are old and life is new. To revitalize the countryside, we should find value and implant modern elements. Zhang Peifen also believes that cultural heritage cannot be isolated. To achieve sustainable development, we should discover, revalue and export rural values, so as to form a intersection between urban and rural areas. "Ten miles of bamboo forest to Yuezhou, a stream of peach flowers with hibiscus." Yuezhou village is the hometown of Song Dynasty poet Zhang yuangan. In recent years, Yuezhou village has repaired Zhang yuangan's former residence, Zhang's ancestral temple and Ningyuan village, rebuilt Hanguang Pavilion and Shuiyue Pavilion, and built a number of tourism infrastructure. The village has complete sightseeing farms, research camps and resorts. The village Ningyuan village has been transformed into an ancient weapons museum after repair. The village also holds photography competitions, couplets competitions, beautiful rural tourism season and other activities. The village runs Nongjiale, opens home stay, or sells self-produced honey, peanuts and camellia oil at the door of its home... Relying on cultural heritage to revitalize the countryside and activate the ancient Yuezhou. Yuezhou village has won the honorary titles of "national civilized village" and "top ten drunken and beautiful villages in Fujian". It receives about 100000 tourists a year. The villagers have received tangible benefits, and migrant workers have returned to live and work in peace and contentment. Zeng Gongrong, the village party secretary, said happily, "now we don't go out to work, we don't worry about selling our products, and we are very proud to go out." (outlook new era)
Edit：Yuanqi Tang Responsible editor：Xiao Yu
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