Characteristics of Shanxi Folk Houses

Few villages in Shanxi, big or small, have no gatehouses.

There is not necessarily a wall around the village, but a memorial building of this kind must be built at the entrance of the avenue to remind the passenger that he has arrived in another village.

Although Hebei also has such a layout, it is not as common as Shanxi.

The architecture of Shanxi folk houses is also very complicated, from the simplest cave dwelling to the profound and rich folk houses in the village, and then to the compact and meticulous attention to houses in the city, which has many special features.

The first feature: caves.

Is to dig holes in the yellow soil for a living.

Needless to say, the loess layer is the natural condition for its production.

Shanxi is located in the Loess Plateau, where the loess is hard, the excavated caves are not easy to collapse, and there is less wood, so caves have become an important form of people's life since ancient times.

According to the report of archaeologists, the Neolithic earth cave sites were found in Dongguan Ancient City in Yuanqu County, Nanlijiao in Ruicheng County and Dongxiafeng in Xiaxian County, Shanxi Province. It already has various types of caves and cave groups, such as single room, double room, semi-crypt type, horizontal excavation and so on.

Because of this natural condition and inconvenient transportation, cave dwelling has long been an important form of folk houses in Shanxi's vast mountainous areas.

The story of eighteen years of cold kiln in Wang Baochuan, which is well known to the masses, is said to have happened in southern Shaanxi.

The poem "Crossing the River Qu", which is anonymous in Ming Dynasty, depicts the cave style in the mountainous area of northwest Shanxi: "The mountain road is rugged, there are many gullies and streams, so people dare not speak, the jade hoof is high and low, the snow and yellow sand are up and down, the huts don't smell chickens and dogs barking, and people are still afraid to cross the road." There is no sound of chickens and dogs outside in the cave. This poem tells the truth.

The second feature: brick quadrangles.

Most of them exist in the small plain of Fenhe basin, where the terrain is not convenient to dig caves, but loess and coal are raw materials for firing bricks and tiles, which creates favorable conditions for their production.

Of course, in these areas, the broad masses of people mainly use adobe to build walls and slag-topped bungalows, or use some bricks.

However, since the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Shanxi's commercial activities have been developed, especially since the middle of Qing Dynasty, the commercial development of banks has been very prosperous and accumulated considerable wealth. In Pingchuan, Shanxi Province, the construction of brick houses is very popular, generally quadrangles, three courtyards, but also two or three courtyards, and even several courtyards are connected in series to form a complex.

For example, Ding Cun in Xiangfen County and Qiaojiabao in Qixian County are among the buildings that are now used as folk museums.

As described by the missionaries in the Qing Dynasty, "In the native areas, many villages are flat-topped, and well-built houses have tall towers, showing the style of out-of-town villages.

Even in areas where such exquisite buildings cannot be built, most houses in Shanxi have solid brick walls and tile roofs "(ibid.).

This kind of brick courtyard is not only suitable for natural conditions, but also the needs of small-scale peasant economy and commercial capital at that time, and it is also the product of several generations of big families and paternalism.

Because at that time, the family was actually both a production unit and a consumption unit, and quadrangles, three-dimensional quadrangles and even more buildings were all living forms that adapted to this condition and requirement.