Ethnic Dwellings in China Traditional Dwellings

Diaofang is a common residential building form in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in southwest China and parts of Inner Mongolia. There is no proper name in the local area, and foreigners call it a bunker because it is built of earth or stone and looks like a bunker. Bunkers generally have 2 ~ 3 floors. Livestock are raised on the ground floor and people live upstairs. Living a nomadic life, Mongolian, Tibetan and other ethnic groups also have "felt tents" in their houses, which are movable tents that are convenient for loading, unloading and transportation. According to the Records of the Later Han Dynasty, it existed before the sixth year of Ding Yuan in the Han Dynasty (A.D.11). This is a house built of rubble or mud, which is three or four stories high. Because it looks like a bunker, it is called a bunker. The name of the bunker can be traced back at least to the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty (AD 1736).

The walls of Tibetan dwellings are thick on the top and thin on the bottom, big on the bottom and small on the outside. The building plane is relatively simple and generally square. Due to the ups and downs of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, if buildings occupy too much land, construction will be more difficult. Therefore, the floor space of buildings is generally small and will develop into space. The folk houses in Naqu, Tibet, are square and slightly arc in shape, with a small courtyard in the middle. The interior is exquisite and meaningful, the exterior style is rich, the sunshine on the plateau is particularly strong, and the house is particularly dazzling in a piece of silver.

Tibetan dwellings are very successful in dealing with the appearance of houses. Because the plane is simple square or square, it is difficult to avoid the monotony of the facade, but the protrusion of wood contrasts with the light and agile large-area thick, wide and heavy stone wall, which not only gives people a heavy feeling, but also enriches the modeling changes. This approach not only pays attention to functional issues, but also takes into account artistic effects and is unique. Ganlan Bamboo House is the main living form of Dai, Wa, Miao, Jingpo, Hani and Bulang ethnic minorities in southern Yunnan. The climate in southern Yunnan is hot, humid and rainy, and the lower part of the bamboo building is overhead, which is used as a rice milling room, storage room and utility room to facilitate ventilation and moisture insulation. There is a wide corridor and terrace in front of the upstairs, followed by the hall and bedroom; The roof lies on the mountain, with steep slopes and far eaves, which can provide shade and rain protection.

The colorful traditional houses in China reflect the characteristics of China's vast territory and rich natural conditions, and it is also a vivid embodiment of the working people's transformation and utilization of nature to adapt to the environment. When giving lectures, we might as well quote "local residents on stamps" to let students know about local folk culture with distinctive features, which will help students to further understand the regional differentiation of geographical environment and the relationship between environment and human beings. Gan Lan's folk houses are mainly distributed in Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangdong, Guangxi and other areas in the southwest, which are the living forms of Dai, Jingpo and Zhuang. Gan Lan is a building made of bamboo and wood. It is a single independent building, with the ground floor overhead, used for raising livestock or storing things, and the upper floor is occupied by people. This kind of building is moisture-proof and can prevent insects, snakes and wild animals from intruding.

The Dai bamboo building is supported by ten pillars, with bamboo sticks and woven straw rafts on the ground, railings and corridors, which are beautiful and unique. The buildings of Naxi nationality in Yongning are all made of wood, centering on people's living, and are also places to sit and rest. The short-legged bamboo building with broken dragons is divided into a front hall and a back hall, which are separated by bamboo fences. Men live in the front hall and women live in the back hall. There are fire pits in the front and back halls. Jingpo Bamboo Building is characterized by long ridges and short eaves. The "Malan" of Zhuang nationality is closer to wooden buildings.

There are also buildings in Sanjiang Dong village in Guangxi, all of which are wooden structures, small veranda buildings and multi-storey buildings, which can be used by several families. Only the bamboo building of Yao people lives downstairs, and food and sundries are stored upstairs. The stable is not in the building, but behind it. Bai's buildings are all east-west, and three rooms are common. The general layout is "three squares and one wall" and "four in five patios". There is a courtyard, people live downstairs, and the middle room is the lobby for receiving guests. The bamboo building of Bulang nationality is very simple, made of bamboo pieces and covered with thatch. There is a fire pit in the center of the building for people to eat and entertain guests, with beds around.

1. East Drum Tower

Every festival, men, women and children in Dong Village will gather in front of the Drum Tower to "step on the song hall" or watch Dong Opera. In summer, people go to the Drum Tower to chat and enjoy the cool. In winter, everyone sits around the fire and tells stories. The Drum Tower is still a place for Dong's family to discuss, rest and entertain. The Drum Tower is a symbol of the Dong people and the unity of the Dong people.

Dong people have the saying that building a village is the first thing. Every Dong family has at least one Drum Tower, and some Dong villages have as many as four or five. In the past, a cowhide drum hung on the Drum Tower. Usually, if there are any important problems in the village, they will go upstairs and knock gongs and drums to convene public discussion. In some places, there are fires, Philippine pirates and drums calling for help. Every village beats drums, and every village answers, so beat drums. In this way, the news spread from one village to another, and soon spread to villages in the distant mountains, and people heard the sound of drums. Therefore, Dong family is especially fond of Drum Tower and Long Drum. Dongzhai Drum Tower looks like a polyhedral pagoda. Generally more than 20 meters high, 1 1 floor to the top, all supported by 16 Chinese fir columns. The center of the building is wide and flat, about 10 square meter, with a brazier made of stone in the middle, wooden railings around it and long benches for rest. The spire of the building has a gourd or a thousand-year-old crane, which symbolizes the auspicious peace of the stockade, and the eaves of the building are prominent, giving people a sense of exquisiteness and elegance.

Zengchong Drum Tower in congjiang county, Guizhou Province was built in the early Qing Dynasty, with a history of 300 years. It is a pagoda with a double gourd roof, 25 meters high and covers an area of 160 square meters. There are four columns inside, each with a diameter of 0.8m and a height of 15m, and the spacing between each column is 3.6m, forming a towering conical square frame, which is the backbone of the oak beam in the Drum Tower. Three meters outside the four inner columns, eight columns with a height of 3.5 meters are erected, which surround the four columns and are radially connected with the four inner columns by purlins. Then stack several layers, with 8 short melon columns vertically stacked on each layer. According to the inner four columns, purlins are shortened layer by layer, which is closely connected with 1 1 layer. At the top of the four pillars, that is, at the top of the 1 1 floor, there are two other octagonal umbrella-top pagodas with eight eaves, which are the top of the Drum Tower.

2. Dai bamboo house

Dai people have lived in Zhulou for 1400 years. Bamboo House is a special living form created by Dai people according to local conditions. As the name implies, bamboo is the main building material. Xishuangbanna is a famous bamboo town, with dozens of kinds of bamboos, such as Dalongzhu, Zhu Jin, Fengweizhu and Phyllostachys pubescens, all of which are natural building materials.

Traditional bamboo buildings are all made of bamboo and thatch. Bamboo building is a dry column building, with thick bamboo or wood as the column, which is divided into two floors. There is no fence around the lower floor, which is specially used for raising livestock and poultry and stacking firewood and sundries. The upper floor is supported by columns, about 5 meters from the ground. Bamboo boards are extremely elastic. There are bamboo fences around the building, and some bamboo fences are woven into various patterns and coated with tung oil. The roof has the shape of four slopes and is covered with straw rafts. A bamboo fence divides the upstairs into two halves, and the back room is the bedroom where the family sleeps. No outsiders are allowed in the bedroom. The outer room is spacious, with a hall and a fireplace. It is not only a place to receive guests, but also a kitchen for cooking and heating. There is a corridor outside the building, with a wooden ladder on one side and an open-air balcony on the other, with pots and pans filled with water.

It is the custom of Dai people to take off their shoes and step on bamboo mats barefoot. Over time, bamboo mats will become bright and shiny. It is really interesting when people step on the wooden ladder, sit on the golden bamboo mat, drink the tea or rice wine sent by their hosts, look at the green oil palm, coconut tree and banana tree outside the window, and listen to the songs of birds.

Dai people like to have an exclusive courtyard. When the children get married, there will be a new courtyard. Whoever builds Hsinchu Building will come to help, send grass rafts and bamboo to help. So the speed of building is very fast, and a building can be built in a day or two. The new building was completed, and men, women and children went to congratulate it. The Dai people's favorite "Zanha" wishes the owner a happy life after moving into a new house with his own singing voice.

With the changes of the times, the traditional bamboo architecture is also evolving. Many bamboo buildings are not all bamboo structures. Some use boards as walls, some use bricks as walls, and some roofs are paved with linoleum, blue tiles or iron sheets instead of thatch. There are no more livestock and poultry downstairs, only for stacking sundries. Great changes have taken place in indoor furnishings, and household appliances such as color TV sets, tape recorders and stereos have become accustomed to it.