Tujia Diaojiaolou Building Craftsmanship
01 · Historical Records
It has a long history, traceable to before the Eastern Han dynasty, with most examples built from the Southern Song dynasty to the 1930s and 1940s.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Chongqing diaojiaolou construction technique is a traditional building craft passed down in the main urban area of Chongqing and some of its districts and counties. The diaojiaolou is built according to local conditions, characterized mainly by its support columns hanging in the air without touching the ground. The slope is opened into upper and lower levels of house foundations; on the lower level longer columns are erected, and on the upper level shorter columns, so that the front half-room's floor is level with the rear half-room's ground, forming a half-side building. With wooden columns, wooden walls, and wooden floors, the buildings all stand on stone retaining walls several metres high, and the house frame is 6–7 metres tall. The outermost column of each row is cut off from top to bottom at the level of the upper foundation, forming a suspended-leg column—hence the name "diaojiaolou" (hanging-leg building). It is a wonder among ethnic architectural crafts and an excellent Tujia ethnic cultural heritage. The Tujia diaojiaolou construction craft is scientific, ingeniously conceived, and reasonably laid out. Tujia carpenters, with their wisdom and using tools in hand such as axes, saws, ink lines, and chisels, carefully build and combine scattered wooden columns, beams, and planks into sturdy buildings. The diaojiaolou has a central hall (tangwu), side rooms or a ground-level main room, a kitchen, and a fire pit; upstairs is the living quarters, and beneath the suspended-leg columns are livestock pens and wood sheds.
Split-level foundation cut into the slope
The slope is cut into two levels; longer posts below and shorter above bring the front floor level with the rear ground, making the half-house.
Cutting the stilt posts level
The outermost post of each row is cut down to the upper foundation, forming the stilt post from which the house takes its name.
A timber house on a stone plinth
Houses stand on stone plinths several metres high with frames of six to seven metres, timber posts, walls and floors, upturned eaves and bracketed joints for stability.
Hall, hearth and livestock under the stilts
A hall, side rooms or earth-shed rooms, kitchen and hearth occupy the house, with living quarters above and cattle sheds and firewood below the stilts.
Qiyao hills, Fangdou hills and the old river street
In Shizhu county the stilt houses spread widely, typified in the Qiyao and Fangdou hills and the old river street, and called ganlan or corner houses locally.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The diaojiaolou stands on flat ground, while the suspended-leg half-side building is constructed on slopes with a greater incline, its rear half resting against the rock and its front half supported by wooden columns; the buildings are made of locally abundant timber. In the Shizhu Tujia Autonomous County, diaojiaolou are very widely distributed, especially typical in the Qiyao Mountains area, the Fangdou Mountains area, and the old river-valley streets; locally they are also called "ganlan" (stilt dwelling), "thousand-columns-to-the-ground style," or "corner-turning building." In construction, local stone and timber materials are fully utilized, with flying eaves and upturned corners, interlocking dou brackets and tie beams, making them sturdy and earthquake-resistant.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Tujia Diaojiaolou Building Craftsmanship · Tujia Diaojiaolou Building Craftsmanship.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
With social development and changes in people's living concepts, as well as the old-town redevelopment in the Chongqing area, both the continuation of the Chongqing diaojiaolou architectural craft culture and the protection of physical structures face extremely severe challenges. Liu Chengbai (per official archive of the associated inheritor): Male, Tujia ethnicity, born July 1952, a native of Shizhu Tujia Autonomous County, Chongqing. Representative inheritor of the fifth national-level batch of the intangible cultural heritage item "Tujia Diaojiaolou Construction Technique." The diaojiaolou he builds have an exterior form with multi-angle layered beauty, novel conception, and strict functional division, with refined joinery of columns, tie beams, square beams, ridge beams, purlins, and rafters. His skill is masterful, his cuts rounded, his work fine and meticulous, his structure rigorous, plain, and highly practical. He has always been enthusiastic about the diaojiaolou construction technique and about training apprentices, and has successively carried out diaojiaolou construction and repair in Chongqing, Hubei, Guizhou, and other places, serving as designer, builder, and technical supervisor, leaving behind many diaojiaolou works.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Wan Taoyuan 04-1933
- Peng Shanyao 04-1934
- Liu Chengbai 05-2888
- Wan Yuqi
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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