Lanzhou Huanghedashuiche Making Craftsmanship
01 · Historical Records
In 1556 AD, Duan Xu drew on the tub-wheel irrigation technique of Tonghe in Yunnan and created in Lanzhou a waterwheel suited to local conditions. In 1952, there were still 252 waterwheels on the banks of the Yellow River in Lanzhou.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Lanzhou lies deep in the interior of the Eurasian continent and has the characteristics of a band-shaped basin city; it has little rainfall and an arid climate. The Yellow River runs through the city from west to east, and the difference in elevation between the river surface and the ground is more than ten to more than twenty meters, bringing abundant natural hydropower resources. The Yellow River waterwheel works by harnessing the force of the current and has become a cheap and efficient irrigation tool. Small waterwheels are seventeen or eighteen meters in diameter and large ones more than twenty meters; there are single-wheel, double-wheel and multi-wheel types, and one waterwheel can irrigate seven or eight hundred mu of farmland. The invention of the waterwheel laid the foundation for the people to live and work in peace and for social harmony and stability. Since electric irrigation technology came into general use, waterwheels have decreased year by year, their makers lack successors, and the craft faces endangerment; protecting the Yellow River big waterwheel making craft has become an urgent and important task.
Adapting the tube wheel locally
In 1556 Duan Xu adapted the Yunnan tube wheel to Lanzhou, turning the ten-to-twenty-metre drop of the Yellow River into usable power.
Building the wheel and its buckets
The frame, spokes and buckets form the skeleton of the wheel; a single wheel of fifteen to twenty metres could irrigate seven or eight hundred mu, held together by wedges and lashings.
Setting a train of wheels
Wheels are built singly, in pairs or in trains; a train must be graded along the drop of the river to lift water stage by stage.
Surveying the last old Yellow River wheel
Duan Yicun drew the only plan of an old Lanzhou water wheel and photographed the last one in thirty-six exposures before it was dismantled.
Designing a range of wheels
He designed indoor ornamental, outdoor landscape and working river wheels in more than twenty sizes, from 36 cm to 18 m in diameter.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Since the late Ming dynasty, big waterwheels have been widely used in Gaolan, Baiyin, Jingchuan, Pingliang, Yinchuan and Shaanxi in the Yellow River basin, promoting the development of agricultural production in these areas.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The Yellow River big waterwheel is an important component of Yellow River culture; it embodies the creativity of the Chinese nation and provides testimony for the study of Chinese agricultural civilization and the history of water conservancy. Duan Yicun (from the official archive of the associated inheritor): male, of Han ethnicity, born in October 1943, a native of Lanzhou, Gansu Province. He is a representative inheritor of the Lanzhou Yellow River Big Waterwheel Making Craft, an item of the fifth national-level batch of intangible cultural heritage. He is a certified craftsman of the Lanzhou Yellow River big waterwheel. By 1969 he was already able to make waterwheels on his own. He researched, organized and drew up the only extant drawings of the ancient Yellow River waterwheels in Lanzhou, and took thirty-six on-site photographs of the last ancient Yellow River waterwheel in Lanzhou. That waterwheel has since been completely dismantled, and these photographs have become precious historical material. He collected materials on the use and improvement of Yellow River waterwheels by water conservancy authorities during the Republican period, as well as waterwheel drawings. He researched and designed a series of waterwheel products — indoor ornamental waterwheels, open-air landscape waterwheels and practical river waterwheels — in specifications ranging from 36 centimeters to 18 meters in diameter, totaling more than twenty models. The waterwheel products have been exhibited in successive provincial and municipal intangible cultural heritage protection achievement exhibitions.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Duan Yicun 05-2758
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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