Hexibaojuan
01 · Historical Records
Hexi precious scrolls are a folk chant-sung popular literature developed from the Tang Dunhuang transformation texts and popular preachings and the Song scripture-telling. They matured and flourished from the Ming and Qing to the Republican period, then fell silent during the Cultural Revolution and began to decline. According to surveys some thirty scroll scripts survive in Liangzhou, mostly woodblock and manuscript copies, with a few mimeographed editions appearing in the early 1980s.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
Transformation texts, popular preachings and scripture-telling mainly absorbed and followed the structure of the Dunhuang Buddhist scriptures, while the Liangzhou precious scrolls, inheriting them, further nationalised, localised and popularised them, making them a form of Chinese folk narrative-singing literature. Hexi precious scrolls fall into four kinds—Buddhist, historical story, myth and legend, and fable—their content reflecting the social life of the people, their themes mostly condemning unfilial cruelty and praising filial piety and good deeds. Their principal form combines prose and verse in chanting and singing, using the response to the Buddha's voice as the chief means of drawing the audience into the singing. Prose is the performing device the scroll-reader uses to narrate plot, explain events, set out relations between figures and indicate time and place, presented as telling or speaking; verse is the device used to lodge judgements of good and evil, advance the plot, express love and hate and heighten atmosphere, presented as intoning or singing. The verse-form scrolls blend various tunes and add some Liangzhou folk-song melodies, such as Crying Through the Five Watches, Lotus Fall and Ten Admonitions to Man. For the Jiuquan scrolls more than seventy tune-titles and singing styles have been collected, and the number of scrolls reaches more than seventy kinds (including titles known but lost), over one hundred and forty books. At present, with the development of the rural economy and changes in living custom, few people any longer willingly hold scroll-chanting activities; as this group of people gradually passes away in the future, the Hexi precious scrolls will face the crisis of extinction.
The Red Silk Precious Scroll
One of the precious scrolls copied and sung by transmitters of the Liangzhou scrolls.
The Precious Scroll of Fourth Sister Fang
One of the precious scrolls copied and sung by transmitters of the Liangzhou scrolls.
The Precious Scroll of Lord Bao
A precious scroll on the cases judged by Lord Bao.
The Precious Scroll of the Twice-Blooming Plum
One of the precious scrolls copied and sung by transmitters of the Liangzhou scrolls.
Scroll-Chanting (Xuanjuan)
The narrative-singing activity of chanting scrolls to exhort goodness for the people during farm slack seasons and festivals.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Hexi precious scrolls circulate mainly in the Hexi corridor of Gansu, one of the few areas of China where narrative-singing still takes place.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Hexibaojuan · Baojuan Sutra Telling · Baojuan Sutra Telling · Baojuan Sutra Telling · Baojuan Sutra Telling.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The Liangzhou precious scrolls developed under the profound influence of Dunhuang popular literature, so that studying the Hexi precious scrolls may be of help to Dunhuang studies. The spirit of the scrolls—urging people toward good and joy in helping others—together with the conduct of filial piety to parents, harmony with brothers and friendship with others and the virtues of diligent production and treasuring grain, has a certain effect on cultivating good character and promoting spiritual civilisation. Today's scroll-readers are mostly old people over seventy.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Qiao Yuan 01-0010
- Li Zuobing 03-0780
- Zhang Donghai 05-1991
- Rui Shilong 05-1992
- Daixingwei 05-1993
- Liu Zhengkun
- Zhao Xufeng
- Wang Lijuan
- Pei Luping
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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