Temple Fair
01 · Historical Records
The fair has been transmitted to the present in a living, group-based form of inheritance. It has rich cultural connotations and a broad participating public, and its influence radiates over the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. The Yaji Mountain Temple Fair arose and took its name from Yaji Mountain, a Daoist sacred site of a thousand years. Located in Liujiadian Town, Pinggu District, Beijing, it has a history of nearly 500 years and an orderly line of transmission, and is as famous as the Miaofeng Mountain Temple Fair of Beijing. Over several hundred years of evolution, the Yaji Mountain Temple Fair developed into an activity of mountain pilgrimage, incense offering and praying for goodness and blessings, with the people of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei as its main body, and it has been preserved and transmitted to the present.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Yaji Mountain Temple Fair is a traditional folk activity centered on and guided by the belief in Bixia Yuanjun, the Lady of the Azure Dawn, with Yaji Mountain as its base and carrier. Its practices and practitioners are relatively concentrated and fixed; it has the characteristics of being group-based, periodic and living. Its temple-market function is rich and active, its cultural significance is prominent, and its state of survival is good. The Qing-dynasty Guangxu Gazetteer of Shuntian Prefecture records that this fair already existed in the Jiajing reign of the Ming dynasty, with the eighteenth day of the fourth lunar month as the main day for offering incense and a fair period of five days. In the early Qing, the fair was changed to run from the first to the twentieth day of the fourth lunar month, a period of twenty days. In recent years, the parade performances of the flower associations (huahui), an important element of the Yaji Mountain Temple Fair, have flourished ever more. More than one hundred huahui directly participate in the fair, with tens of thousands of participants; among them, the Wanzhuangzi Huahui and the Beidian Dragon Lantern Old Association both have histories of one hundred years. The huahui performances encompass lion dance, dragon lanterns, martial arts and drum dance, with rich content and diverse forms. The social function of the fair is mainly expressed in guiding the people's moral spirit and building a harmonious society.
The eighteenth, the main pilgrimage day
The Guangxu gazetteer records the fair since the Jiajing era, with the eighteenth of the fourth lunar month as its central day and five days in all.
The extended twenty-day term
In the early Qing the fair stretched from the first to the twentieth of the fourth month, its greatest expansion.
A hundred flower-association processions
More than a hundred flower associations now take part, some tens of thousands strong, each presenting in turn.
Wanzhuangzi and Beidian lantern associations
Two associations with a century of history anchor the fair, and the newer troupes largely learn their art from them.
Lion, dragon, martial arts and drums
Lion dances, lantern dragons, martial displays and drumming give the fair its variety and its appeal.
Thirty-three association steles
At least thirty-three steles record the associations, their age and range making them evidence for historians.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The local stratification of the Yaji Mountain Temple Fair is most clearly marked by the number of huahui troupes. More than one hundred huahui directly participate in the fair, with tens of thousands of participants; among them, the Wanzhuangzi Huahui and the Beidian Dragon Lantern Old Association both have hundred-year histories — the coexistence of old associations and new troupes shows that the huahui here have their own lineage and threshold, and a newcomer must follow an old association through the full round of procedures before being counted as initiated. Lion dance, dragon lanterns, martial arts and drum dance each form their own strand, and each village organizes its team according to its own tradition, without mixing them up. The believers' sphere covers Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Inner Mongolia and Liaoning, places close in geography and affinity; most of those who come to worship at the mountain are fully constituted incense associations, with benevolent associations and flower associations each performing their own duties. Yaji Mountain is as famous as the Miaofeng Mountain Temple Fair of Beijing; the two are both centers of the belief in Bixia Yuanjun in the Jingdong area east of the capital, so believers move back and forth between the two mountains, and the incense-association steles also bear cross-provincial inscriptions. At least thirty-three incense-association steles survive, covering a wide area and well preserved, leaving hard evidence for the extent of this belief network.
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04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The Yaji Mountain Temple Fair is transmitted mainly as group inheritance: the huge body of believers from Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Inner Mongolia and Liaoning are interconnected amid dynamic social change while maintaining a relatively stable state, displaying the typical features of the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region — proximity in geography, closeness in human ties and continuity in culture. The cultural value of the Yaji Mountain Temple Fair is expressed as follows: first, the incense-association steles have outstanding historical and cultural value; at least thirty-three survive, of long standing, wide geographic coverage and good preservation, and they can provide reference for official histories, government compilations and local gazetteers, and for the study of the history of human activity and social change; second, the spontaneously organized incense-association activities continue unbroken, with benevolent associations and flower associations transmitted for several centuries and still today an important component and the greatest highlight of the fair. The fair has radiated and driven the transmission and development of huahui art both within and beyond the region, with more than one hundred huahui coming to the mountain every year to perform. Third, oral literature passes on the cultural genes: more than ninety legendary tales of the fair are rich in content, vivid and fresh, and are treasures of folk literature. The believers carry on the tradition of the "good people of one mountain" at the Yaji Mountain Temple Fair, with the belief in goodness and upward striving running throughout; this gives impetus to the building of spiritual civilization in the new era.
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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