Chensanwuniang Legend
01 · Historical Records
In the Ming dynasty the “gezai albums” and xian管 songs compiled from this story were many and varied and were sung for a time.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Chensanwuniang legend tells the love story of Chen San of Quanzhou, who on his way to escort his elder brother and sister-in-law to their post in Guangnan passed through Chaozhou, met Huang Wuniang by chance at the Lantern Festival and fell in love at first sight with her, and after many twists and turns was at last united with her in marriage. The legend has become a subject for creation in many art forms—among the known ones, oral storytelling, gezai albums, xian管 sung melodies, xiqu, fiction, film, picture-story books and porcelain carving—and images of Chen San gazing at the lanterns and Wuniang throwing down lychees are even commonly seen in the decorative patterns of old-style folk sleeping beds and clothes chests. The Chensanwuniang legend has a strong realism: it has none of the marvellousness of myth nor the unpredictability of immortals, and its plot is close to ordinary life. The legend has a long history. In modern times five xiqu sole survivors, such as The Three Ming Editions and the lychee-mirror romances The Tale of the Lychee Mirror and The Record of the Lychee, discovered successively in libraries in Japan, Britain and Germany, together with the Qing Qianlong edition of the “gezai album” from Taiwan, have become historical testimony to the wide influence of the legend. Related classical-Chinese and vernacular novels appeared one after another. The Chensanwuniang legend has been handed down for generations in southern Fujian and the Chaozhou-Shantou region, and has a positive enlightening effect on young men and women breaking free of the bonds of feudal ethics and striving for freedom in marriage.
Chen San Gazes at the Lanterns
The legendary episode in which Chen San of Quanzhou, passing through Chaozhou, meets Huang Wuniang by chance at the Lantern Festival.
Wuniang Throws Down the Lychee
Wuniang throws down a handkerchief-wrapped lychee to Chen San, pledging their love.
The Tale of the Lychee Mirror
A Ming play taking the lychee and mirror as the bond of love, one of the sole surviving texts preserved in libraries in Japan, Britain and Germany.
Legends of the Chen San Dyke and the Dressing Tower
Local-feature legends attached to such remains as the Chen San dyke, the Dressing Tower, the Qingyang Chamber and the fallen banyan.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The Chensanwuniang legend is rich in content and spans a great range of time and space, with a strong local colour; it may be roughly divided into four categories: first, the stories that take place in Wuniang's home district of Chaozhou; second, the stories that take place in Chen San's home district of Quanzhou, namely the stories of the two eloping to Quanzhou and being arrested and imprisoned by the authorities; third, the stories about Chen San's elder brother Chen Yunshi and Wuniang's maid Yichun; and fourth, the stories relating to such sites as the Qingyang Chamber, the fallen banyan and the Chen San dyke. Chen San's home district has the Chen San dyke and Wuniang's old home the Dressing Tower, so that many people to this day still prefer to believe them true; the legend spread widely, not only in Minnan-dialect regions at home and abroad but also written into a novel by a Japanese writer, while the European sinologists Piet van der Loon and Kristofer Schipper studied it over many years and published on it.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The Chensanwuniang legend is transmitted mainly as a collective and spontaneous oral tradition. To this day the tradition circulates unfailingly at home and abroad; it is at once a topic and vehicle that sustains nostalgia for home and one of the important subjects for creation and adaptation in many art forms, and possesses a certain historical, artistic and social-cultural value.
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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