Green Tea Processing Craftsmanship

Ⅷ-148Traditional CraftsmanshipNanjing, JiangsuBatch 5 (2021)Extension ItemFeatured

01 · Historical Records

Nanjing's record of tea production is very early, but Yuhua tea took shape in modern times. In 1907, the first-generation inheritor Lu Ying and others founded the Jiangnan Tea-Planting Institute at the foot of Purple Mountain, planting and making tea around Linggu Temple and bringing tea growing, making, and tasting together in one place—regarded as the opening chapter of Yuhua tea. Thereafter the craft passed down along the master-apprentice line, starting around Linggu Temple and gradually expanding from the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum area to the whole of Nanjing and surrounding regions; it has now reached the sixth generation. The intercropping of trees and tea and the row-planting of tea bushes in the tea gardens also started here, planting trees and tea in separate rows to conserve soil and water and facilitate picking; later this was adopted by China's vast tea regions.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

Yuhua tea-making craft is one of the representative Chinese traditional green tea crafts of the needle class; the core areas where it is practiced are the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum scenic area and the Yuhua Terrace scenic area in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. The Yuhua tea-making craft mainly includes several process steps: fresh-leaf picking, spreading, kill-green, rolling, mao huo (low fire), shaping, zuo huo (foot fire), refining, baking, and packaging, of which the shaping process is the most critical. It perfectly combines the strip-rubbing, strip-grasping, and strip-straightening techniques, forming a unique needle-shaped tea craft that gathers the strengths of both flat-leaf and curly-leaf tea classes. Yuhua tea artisans adapt the craft to the tea, holding fast to the traditional sieving method best suited to Yuhua tea to select leaves, and through unique sieving methods such as shaking, lifting, and floating, separate the leaves by thickness, length, and weight. A specially made conical bamboo roasting basket allows a stepped distribution of charcoal temperature; the sifted tea tumbles from top to bottom inside the basket, and with a unique aroma-raising and drying method, the room-fillingly fragrant Yuhua tea is thus produced. The finished Yuhua tea resembles pine needles—tight, fine, round, and straight, with upright, elegant tips, a green and lustrous color, and faintly visible white down; its inner quality offers an elegant aroma and a fresh, mellow taste, with tender, green, and bright leaves at the bottom, much loved by the public. The Yuhua tea pine-needle process has been included in the national standard (GB/20605-2006). Nanjing has produced tea since ancient times. The century-old Yuhua tea is a cultural calling card of Nanjing and Jiangsu; the Yuhua tea industry has become a leading industry of Nanjing's urban agriculture. Advanced techniques such as 'intercropping of trees and tea' and 'row-planting of tea' have led the development direction of tea planting and making in China's vast tea regions. The unique Yuhua tea-making craft, with its tight, fine, round, straight pine-needle shape and upright, elegant tips, its refined inner quality of elegant aroma and fresh, mellow taste, and its orthodox, pure, harmonious, and elegant tea art, adds a rich and brilliant stroke to Chinese tea culture.

Documented Process Records

The Yuhua tea-making craft mainly includes several process steps: fresh-leaf picking, spreading, kill-green, rolling, mao huo (low fire), shaping, zuo huo (foot fire), refining, baking, and packaging, of which the shaping process is the most critical.

Shaking, lifting and skimming

Hand sieving uses three motions to separate leaf by weight, by length and by taking the middle fraction.

The conical bamboo drying cage

A conical bamboo cage lets charcoal heat rise in layers so the leaf rolls downward and dries evenly.

Rubbing, gripping and combing the needles

Shaping combines rubbing, gripping and combing to gather the virtues of flat and curled teas into one needle.

Interplanting trees with tea and row planting

Rows of tea interplanted with trees keep the soil and ease picking; the method spread from Nanjing to other growing regions.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

Tea gardens are mainly distributed on loess hilllands between 20 and 50 meters above sea level; the soil is yellow-red earth, weakly acidic, with 1.89 percent organic matter and moderate fertility, favorable to the growth of tea plants. Nanjing's unique geographical environment nurtures the distinctive inner quality of Yuhua tea.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

In 1907, the first-generation inheritor Lu Ying and others founded the nationwide tea research institution Jiangnan Tea-Planting Institute at Purple Mountain in Nanjing, planting and making tea around Linggu Temple, making them the founders of Yuhua tea. At present, the transmission scope of the Yuhua tea-making craft has gradually expanded from the Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum area to the whole of Nanjing and surrounding regions, and it has been transmitted to the sixth generation. Among these, the fifth-generation inheritor group of 52 people and the sixth-generation inheritor group of 103 people are the main force in the current transmission and development of the Yuhua tea craft, active on the front lines of Yuhua tea craft transmission, training, performance and exhibition, brand creation, and production.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

Green Tea Processing Craftsmanship (Nanjing, Jiangsu) · China ICH Official Project Archive

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗

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