The Story or History of Hakka Tulou

The story or history of Hakka Tulou:

Tulou residents live in groups by caste and its construction features are closely related to the history of the Hakka people.

The Hakka people were originally Han Chinese in the Central Plains, and were forced to migrate southward due to various reasons such as war and famine, and by the time of the Southern Song Dynasty, they had lasted for nearly a thousand years and had traveled for thousands of miles to form the Hakka folk line in the border areas of Fujian, Guangdong and Gan provinces. In the process of their forced to leave their homes, displaced from their homeland, experienced a lot of hardship, they have a deep experience, whether it is a long-distance displacement, or new to an unfamiliar place of residence,

Many of the difficulties have to rely on their own unity and solidarity, work together to solve the problem, **** degree of difficulty. Therefore, every time they come to a place, the family members of this family name always gather together. This also formed a unique architectural form of Hakka houses - Tulou.

Because the Hakka people live in most of the remote mountainous areas or deep in the mountains, not only the lack of building materials, jackals, wolves, tigers, thieves and noisy, coupled with the fear of local attacks, the Hakka people will create a "defense" of the castle-style architecture of the residence --- Tulou.

Tulou.

Tulou focuses on defense requirements. Min, Guangdong, Gan three provinces border area is a piece of wilderness, as late as the early 20s, there are still a number of primitive forests, insects and snakes, wild animals. For a long time in history, this place is not only "the emperor is far away", the court can not reach, even Fuzhou, Guangzhou, Nanchang, the capital of the three provinces, but also due to get along with the extreme, the pass firm road danger and can not help.

The Hakka people, in addition to often encountering tough indigenous attacks, have migrated to different family names of the family also constantly occur between the death of the armed struggle. The harsh living environment forced the family Hakka people attach great importance to defense, they will build their homes into a fortified city that is easy to defend and difficult to attack, and live together. Tulou water wells, granaries, animal pens and other living primary firearms era, Tulou so that the Hakka people get enough security.

In the Hakka people, there are a lot of stories circulating in the enemy attacked for a long time, "building safe and sound".

Expanded Information:

Structural Classification of Hakka Tulou:

There are 3 main types of Hakka Tulou typical, which are the five phoenix buildings, the square buildings, and the round cottages.

1, five phoenix building, from the overall point of view, the five phoenix building centered on three halls contains a clear sense of primary and secondary inferiority, it can be affirmed that it is a continuation of the development of the ancient courtyard-style layout of the middle reaches of the Yellow River domain, which is the birthplace of the Hakka culture, and in the combination of its groups, only the upper hall at the end of the axis (the main hall) adopts the solid and thick rammed earth bearing wall.

2, square building: the layout of the square building is similar to the five phoenix building, but its thick earth wall from the upper hall expanded to the overall periphery, it is very obvious that the defense is greatly strengthened.

3, round fortress, in the round building, three halls of the house has been hidden, respect and inferiority seriously weakened; fortress is a fortress, the defensive function rose to the first place, just like an extremely effective paramilitary project.

4, the round building is the most characteristic building in the local tulou group, generally with a center of the circle, according to a different radius, layer by layer outward expansion, as the water waves in the lake, ring by ring, very spectacular. The most central place is the family ancestral temple, outward in turn for the ancestral hall, around the corridor, the outermost ring of people. The entire Tulou room of the same size, an area of about ten square meters or so, using the **** the same staircase, the families almost no secrets to say.

Tulou structure has many types of types, one of which is the interior of the upper, middle and lower three halls along the central axis of the deep arrangement of the three-tang system, in such a Tulou, generally the lower hall for the entrance and exit, placed at the forefront; the middle of the hall is in the center of the family gatherings, welcoming the guests of hospitality; the upper hall is in the innermost part of the hall is the place where the ancestral tablets are enshrined.

In addition to the structural uniqueness of the Tulou, the internal bay window, porch, eaves, etc. are also extremely gorgeous and exquisite, is really a wonder of Chinese residential architecture.

Baidu Encyclopedia - Hakka Tulou