Temple Fair
01 · Historical Records
The origins of the Taibo Temple Fair are closely tied to the historical deeds of Taibo yielding the throne, fleeing south, settling in Meili and founding the ancient state of "Gouwu." In the second year of the Yongxing era of the Eastern Han (154), people built a temple at the site of Taibo's former residence, and "sacrifices were offered at the proper seasons through the generations without interruption." Since the 1980s, members of the Zhide lineage at home and abroad, comprising twelve surnames (Wu, Zhou, Cai, Jiang, Wang, Ke, Xin, Weng, Cao, Hong, Fang and Gong), have come in groups to the Taibo Temple Fair to sacrifice to their primordial ancestor Taibo and to recognize and seek their roots. The Taibo Temple Fair takes its name from a monarch who yielded the throne. Taibo yielded the throne and fled south, settled in Meili and founded the ancient state of Gouwu; these deeds have been told and retold in Jiangnan and became the core resource of local belief. In the second year of the Yongxing era of the Eastern Han, people built a temple at the site of Taibo's former residence, and thereafter sacrifices were offered at the proper seasons through the generations without interruption - the fair's calendar grew directly out of this tradition of seasonal sacrifice. The combination of the fair with agricultural trade was a key step. After the sacrificial activities merged with the rural "festival market" (jiechang), the annual agricultural cycle coincided with the fair's dates, and shopping, visiting relatives and meeting friends were all accomplished on the occasion of the fair; the fair thus changed from a pure sacrificial rite into the yearly market day of rural society. Since the 1980s, the twelve surnames of the Zhide lineage at home and abroad have come in groups to the fair, greatly strengthening its character as ancestral sacrifice and root-seeking, and the fair has added a modern function of clan root-seeking on top of the old custom.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Taibo Temple Fair is a traditional temple fair held on the ninth day of the first lunar month (Taibo's birthday) at Meicun in the New District of Wuxi City, Jiangsu Province. Taibo Temple is the core vehicle of the Taibo Temple Fair, while Meicun and Hongshan are its main activity spaces. Confucius praised Taibo as a man of "supreme virtue" (zhide), and the Records of the Grand Historian places him first among the "Hereditary Houses." Thereafter, sacrificial activities merged with the culture of the rural traditional agricultural market, the "festival market" (jiechang), gradually giving shape to the custom of the Taibo Temple Fair. The Taibo Temple Fair mainly comprises two great contents: the sacrifice to Taibo and the fair itself. The sacrificial ritual has a strict agenda, including three beats of the sacrificial drum, music and dance to welcome the deity, the chief sacrificer offering incense, the three offerings of libations with music, the reading of the sacrificial text and the laying down of silk offerings, and music and dance to send off the deity. Those taking part in the sacrificial ritual include the band and accompanying dancers; the chief sacrificer and the offering presenters are elders of the Zhide lineage. The sacrifice to Taibo is one of the core contents of the fair, giving the Taibo Temple Fair its profound connotation of remembering the spirit of "supreme virtue"; the poems and encomia left behind by famous worthies and literati of successive ages who came to pay homage at Taibo Temple are proof of this. During the fair, merchants gather in crowds, the local products and customs of the Wu land converge here, and folk artistes compete to display their skills, vividly reflecting the character of Wu culture. The influence of the Taibo Temple Fair is far-reaching. The Taibo Temple Fair has thus become one of the cultural bonds maintaining ties with the homeland. With remembrance of Taibo's spirit of supreme virtue at its core, the Taibo Temple Fair has practical significance for the building of social morality. At the same time, the fair attracts vast numbers of lineage members at home and abroad, which is conducive to safeguarding ethnic unity and national unity.
Three rounds of the ceremonial drum
Three rounds of the drum open the rite, setting the tone and silencing the ground before the sacrifice.
Dancing welcome and the chief incense
After the welcoming dance the chief worshipper lights the incense, an office held by elders of the descendant clans.
The three musical offerings
Music accompanies three offerings while the text is read and the silks laid, pairing sound with words in Wu-region ritual.
The sending of the god
The rite closes with a dancing send-off, music and dancers withdrawing as the sequence that opened the rite concludes.
The first month's ninth, Taibo's birthday
The ninth of the first lunar month is Taibo's birthday, drawing unbroken crowds to Meicun for several days.
Twelve clans seeking their ancestor
Descendant clans from twelve surnames travel from home and abroad to honour Taibo and affirm their shared lineage.
Fair and periodic market combined
Beyond worship the fair merges with the periodic market, traders and folk artists gathering to show the character of Wu culture.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The spatial pattern of the Taibo Temple Fair unfolds around Meili: with Taibo Temple as the core vehicle, Meicun and Hongshan form the two main activity spaces; the sacrificial rites are held in the temple while the bustle of the market falls in the village, and village and temple are joined into one by the road taken during the fair. The Hongshan area still retains traces of relics related to Taibo, which together with Meicun support the integrity of this landscape of belief. The participants fall into two layers, inner and outer: local villagers and surrounding village communities attending the fair according to old custom provide its everyday vitality; the twelve surnames of the Zhide lineage coming in groups from home and abroad bring it a formal clan character. The two streams of people converge during these days around the ninth of the first month: on one side the jumble of the festival market, on the other the solemnity of ritual; one and the same site carrying two atmospheres at once is the typical face of a temple fair in the Wu land.
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04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The Taibo Temple Fair and Taibo Temple overlap to a considerable degree in cultural space, providing a case study for the integrated research and protection of cultural heritage, and for examining the mutually generative relationship between intangible cultural heritage and tangible cultural heritage.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Hu Wenxiang 04-1974
- Guan Zhangxun 04-1975
- Cheng Zhongxin 05-3018
- Wang Defeng
- Luo Binggen
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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