Living in a Great World —— Hakka Wai House in Pingshan Castle, Shenzhen

Dawan Shiju is located in Hakka Village, southwest of Pinghuan Community, No.33 Dawan Road, Pingshan District, Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province. Built in the fifty-sixth year of Qingganlong (179 1), it is a castle-style Hakka enclosure building, covering an area of 25,000 square meters, with a building area of 1.66 million square meters and more than 400 houses.

The internal structure of the Great World Mansion consists of nine streets, eighteen courtyards and eight floors, and the Zoumalou is connected in series. In the streets and alleys where people have lived for a long time, they all extend in all directions, and the north-south pattern is symmetrical.

From the plane layout, the residential buildings in Dawan City are rectangular, with the ancestral hall, the middle building and the back building as the central axis, and two rows of two-story residential buildings with the same architectural form, pattern and size are symmetrically distributed on both sides. The gate of Weilongwu faces south, and there are four characters of "Four Seas Mansions" on the gatehouse. There are Wo Ping and yuechi county in front of the door, followed by sand dunpi, which is a trinity of water storage, irrigation and flood control. The city wall is more than six meters high and surrounded on all sides, with a circumference of about 500 meters. It is rammed with concrete, and there is a walking corridor on the top of the wall, which is called "Ten Pavilion Walking Corridor". There are also three-story watchtowers around, and the loopholes are widely distributed.

Surrounded by a courtyard wall about 80 cm thick, there is a moat outside the wall, a watchtower around the wall, and a half-moon wind pool in front of the whole building. There are three doors in the main wall, and the middle door is an archway. The archway is decorated with cornices and gray plastic, and the wooden components are beautifully carved. The left and right doors, the middle door enters the courtyard through the gatehouse, and the ancestral hall is in the middle. Generally speaking, the ancestral temple is a place to unite clan strength, strengthen clan unity, resist foreign aggression and handle internal affairs, and it is also a political and cultural center of a clan. The ancestral temple is the architectural center of a large group of people living in the world. The ancestral tablet "Duan Yi Gongci". The ancestral hall is divided into three entrances, and the wooden signs of "Guangzong Yaozu" and "Yiyan Jimou" are hung in the front hall. On both sides of the main hall and the main beam, three plaques are hung, which are: "Praise for political talents …" and "Be eager to make meritorious deeds and be brave …". There is a shrine in the middle of the back hall, which is engraved with the shrine of "Zhuiyuan Hall" to worship the memorial tablet of the Zeng family.

The characteristics of the great eternal residence

The architectural style of "three places in the front, three places in the middle and two places in the left and right", also known as "three halls and two horizontal", is a typical Hakka architectural style. The architectural style embodies the traditional feudal etiquette system in the Central Plains and the basic format of manor-style wharf in Han and Jin Dynasties, and reflects its historical origin. Therefore, Hakka architecture deeply contains the unique family system and hierarchical concept of Confucian culture, such as ancestral hall, clear primary and secondary, with ancestral hall as the central axis running through the whole and symmetrical layout. The back wall of the whole building is built in a semi-circular arc shape, which echoes the front half-moon wind pool. It is the classic Confucian thought of balance of yin and yang, harmony between heaven and earth, and harmony between man and nature.

"Suitable for all ages" not only embodies its profound Central Plains culture, but also has obvious social functions.

Defensive

Only the three doors of the main entrance building can enter and exit the great Wanshiju. The main entrance building is a two-story building, with people standing guard during the day, all three doors closed at night, and people on duty in the attic. The four corners of the whole building have towers as high as ten meters, which are guarded day and night. There is also a watchtower on the second side of the middle building in the hospital to prevent accidents. The main entrance building is also engraved with many blastholes and blastholes. Whenever there is a dispute with the outside world, once the door is closed, guns and cannons are used to resist. This structure is not only used to defend against enemies, but also to defend against wild animals. This defensive building fully embodies its cultural psychology of self-protection.

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The great literati live in the whole building complex, which is self-contained. Because the surrounding buildings are totally enclosed, two horizontally distributed open-air inner courtyards, also known as Shangtian Street and Xia Tian Street, were developed in front of and behind the three main halls. Shangxiatianjie is a public activity place for minority children to play, as well as a public kitchen, bathroom, warehouse and complete drainage system. Besides public wells, every household has wells. The people plow at sunrise and rest at sunset, leading a self-sufficient life.

consistent

There is a strong sense of my group in the world. There are about 400 large and small rooms in the big bowl stone house, and each room is connected. Two rows of houses are connected by corridors and walls, and the same row of houses are connected by doors. Hakkas have always paid attention to unity, and even today they still regard the whole village as their relatives, which has a lot to do with the history of Hakkas migrating from the Central Plains to Lingnan. They not only need the help of their people to overcome the difficulties on the road, but also settle down in a new place, which will inevitably lead to conflicts and struggles with the locals. More importantly, they need people to unite and be consistent with the outside world. This tradition of not distinguishing between you and me is embodied in architecture, and its defense function is particularly prominent when avoiding outsiders.

patriarchal clan system

Hakka originally belonged to the Han nationality in the Central Plains, and the patriarchal clan system in the history of the Han nationality has always been reflected and preserved in Hakka architecture and pattern. Rooms are allocated in strict order of seniority. The houses on the central axis belong to children and grandchildren, and the people live in the wing according to their relatives and friends. The Hakkas who have lived here for more than 200 years consciously abide by the official residence system left by their ancestors. Although children and grandchildren will never be separated, if there are not enough houses, they will still build new houses in the yard. The roofs of ancestral halls, middle buildings and other buildings are vertical shingles. According to the clan, for fear of future generations' decline, it can be used to repair the house with leaking tiles, which shows that the ancestors had good intentions.

Dawan Stone House is one of the large-scale and well-preserved Hakka enclosed buildings in Shenzhen. The Zeng family lives, lives and works here, preserving the historical and folk relics and cultural essence of Hakka people. The architectural style of "Dashiwanju" embodies the traditional feudal etiquette system in the Central Plains and the basic format of manor-style wharf in Han and Jin Dynasties, and reflects the historical origin of "Dashiwanju". It reflects the social and cultural characteristics of each period and the wandering changes of Hakkas, which is of great historical and artistic value. It is also a living fossil to study and experience the origin, folk customs, architectural art and water conservancy projects of Shenzhen, which is of great value to understand the Hakka people and their origin and migration history. The ancestral teachings of the Zeng family created the great family style of "benevolence and love" of the Wan Zeng family. "Worship the ancestors for thousands of years" not only embodies the strong clan concept of the Zeng family, but also embodies the inheritance of the filial piety culture of Zongsheng and the family style of the Zeng family's "cautious pursuit of the future", showing the strong atmosphere of the Zeng family living in harmony.