Hengshuifatiediaobantayinjiyi
01 · Historical Records
During the Yongle reign of the Ming dynasty, a Yan-surnamed peddler from Yanzhuang in Hengshui traveled across prefectures, keen at seizing business opportunities; learning that scholars loved famous calligraphers' model books through the ages, he rubbed and printed stone inscriptions from various places, lightly mounted them, and sold them on the side. Seeing many buyers but the inconvenience of rubbing stone inscriptions, he conceived the idea of carving model books himself.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Taocheng District of Hengshui City lies in the heart of the North China Plain, by the beautiful Hengshui Lake; here more than ten villages engrave model books, of which Yanzhuang is the largest in scale, its villagers mostly knowing the techniques of block carving and rubbing, producing exquisite prints. Sourcing materials locally in Hengshui, they tried using fruitwood in place of stone slabs, and after repeated trials finally succeeded, and proceeded to carve. Thereafter the craft was passed down through generations, and for a time several Hengshui villages became specialised model-book-making villages. The Hengshui model books are unrivalled both in carving skill and in rubbing method: the carving, with an upright knife and standing lines, is skilled and fluid, reproducing the spirit of the original, while the rubbings come in many forms—the cicada-wing rubbing and the black-gold rubbing—exquisitely fine. The process steps are: selecting and finalising the text, choosing and preparing materials, carving the block, and rubbing and binding.
Process-Step Record
The process steps are: selecting and finalising the text, choosing and preparing materials, carving the block, and rubbing and binding.
Selecting and finalising the text
The copy is chosen and collated letter by letter, and only once it is settled does the block making begin.
Choosing blocks: fruitwood in place of stone
Locally sourced fruitwood was tried in place of stone and proved successful, giving an even surface to take ink and reverse cutting.
Carving the block with an upright knife
The carver holds an upright knife so that lines run thin and taut; turns are made with one lift and one press, keeping the original brush energy.
Cicada-wing and black-gold rubbings
Among many rubbing styles, the cicada-wing print is thin and light while the black-gold print is dense as lacquer, each revealing a different character.
Yanzhuang print shops in Liulichang
At its height, prints from Yanzhuang were sold in Tianjin, Beijing, Shandong and Shanxi, with more than a dozen shops in Liulichang.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
At its height, besides selling from shops established locally, the prints were also sold to Tianjin, Beijing, Shandong, Shanxi, and other places; in Beijing's Liulichang alone there were more than a dozen Yanzhuang print shops, the most famous being 'Yimo Tang' and 'Mobao Zhai.' At its height, Yanzhuang prints were sold not only from local shops but also reached Tianjin, Beijing, Shandong, and Shanxi; Liulichang in Beijing once had more than a dozen Yanzhuang print shops, of which Yimo Tang and Mobao Zhai were among the better-known brands. Among the dozen-odd villages on the lakeside plain of Taocheng District, households that still carve blocks and make rubbings can be seen to this day.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The carving of model books began in commerce and ended in art: the Yan-surnamed peddler, seeing the brisk sales of rubbings from stone inscriptions, found the way to carved model books, replacing the stone surface that could only be rubbed with wooden blocks that could be printed in quantity, which gave rise to the practice of using fruitwood in place of stone slabs. The carver's upright knife and standing lines must both hold the blade's edge and preserve the original brush conception, so that in rubbing the lightness of the cicada-wing print and the dense ink of the black-gold print can each be applied; hence Hengshui's model books have long been famed for the two perfections of carving and rubbing. Stone plates easily erode and wooden blocks easily decay; whether a model book survives depends entirely on whether the carver's and rubber's hand skills are consummate, which is also why most villagers around Yanzhuang know the block-carving and rubbing technique. Today the Yanzhuang area remains the centre of a dozen-odd model-book-carving villages, and the Taocheng District Model-Book Museum takes charge of collecting and displaying old blocks and rubbings.
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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