Folk Beliefs and Customs

Ⅹ-85Folk CustomsDeqing, GuangdongBatch 3 (2011)Extension Item

01 · Historical Records

The main contents of the Dragon Mother's Birthday include the mass pilgrimage to celebrate her birthday, the Dragon Mother's bathing, the Dragon Mother's changing of clothes, the merciful dragon and filial son's worship of their mother, the teaching of charity and the release of living creatures, and the veneration of sacred traces.

02 · Core Techniques & Process

The Yuecheng Dragon Mother's Birthday is a traditional folk belief custom of worshipping the sea god, held at regular intervals at the Dragon Mother Ancestral Temple in Yuecheng, Deqing County, Guangdong Province. The Yuecheng Dragon Mother Ancestral Temple was first built in the Qin-Han period; in the Xining era of the Song dynasty the court conferred on the Dragon Mother the title Lady of Eternal Aid (Yongji Furen). Every year, from the first to the eighth day of the fifth lunar month for the Dragon Mother's birth birthday, and from the first to the eighth day of the eighth lunar month for her attainment birthday, people from all walks of life in the locality hold grand temple fairs to seek good fortune and pray for blessings, and believers from home and abroad come in an endless stream.

Bathing and changing the goddess

Before the celebrations the image is washed with clean water and dressed in newly made coloured robes, then returned to the hall.

The great pilgrimage for the birthday

Villages enter in procession, drums sounding three times before each group passes into the hall to offer incense and vows.

The Filial Son rite and its chanting

Two groups of filial worshippers chant in alternation, while boatfolk leave a bowl of water at the steps for safe voyages.

Release of living creatures and veneration of the traces

Living creatures are released into the pond and visitors walk a circuit of the historic sites, each with its own story.

03 · Regional Records & Related Items

The Yuecheng Dragon Mother Ancestral Temple stands on the water route of the Yuecheng river valley, a tributary of the West River; the people of Deqing treat the Dragon Mother as the guardian deity of the water route, and villages, lineages, and ferry crossings each established their own temples, though the most flourishing incense is still that of the ancestral temple. The ancestral temple was founded as early as the Qin-Han period; after the court conferred on her the title Lady of Eternal Aid in the Xining era of the Song, the boat people on both banks attributed to her both the vows made before setting sail and the fulfillment of vows after returning. During the birth birthday from the first to the eighth day of the fifth lunar month and the attainment birthday from the first to the eighth day of the eighth lunar month, in the days around the eighth the villages carry images of the Dragon Mother into the ancestral temple for the mass pilgrimage celebrating her birthday; the Dragon Mother's bathing and changing of clothes are scheduled before and after the birthday celebration — first purifying the body, then changing into new garments — the order of the rites resembling that of a common household's wedding. The rites of the two processions honoring the merciful dragon and the filial son each have their own troupes, one answering the other, joining the folk understanding of filial virtue to the narrative of the divine; charity and the release of living creatures, together with the veneration of sacred traces, merge the believers' beneficence with sightseeing, and all day long someone burns incense and someone offers flowers on the stone steps before the temple. Deqing people scattered overseas have carried the Dragon Mother's Birthday to the South Seas, and the ancestral temple and the diaspora communities exchange invitations for incense and dragon tablets; the censers of overseas Dragon Mother temples mostly bear the place name of the ancestral temple. The temple fair's organization is also distinctive. The stewards manage income and expenditure and the schedule, the ritualists direct the chants, the drummers set the rhythm, the cooks prepare vegetarian feasts, and the carrying of the images and the ceremonial attendants are rotated among the able-bodied men of the lineage, changing every year so that everyone takes a turn. The ancestral temple was founded as early as the Qin-Han period; after the court conferred on the Dragon Mother the title Lady of Eternal Aid in the Xining era of the Song, the imperial titles accumulated layer upon layer, and the regulations of the sacrifice grew ever more elaborate: offerings on the birth birthday, scripture chanting on the attainment birthday, the filial son's worship of his mother, and charity and the release of living creatures each occupy one day, and within the eight days no rite may be repeated. In recent years the temple's architecture and woodcarvings have been protected by the state as a key cultural relic protected unit, so visitors can enter the halls, while the village troupes continue their rotation as before.

04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding

It is now a national-level key cultural relic protected unit. This project is of great significance for carrying forward the fine traditions of the Chinese nation and strengthening the cohesion of the Chinese nation, and also has value for research in religious studies, folklore, and history.

05 · Associated Representative Bearers

Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:

Wu Jishan 05-3019
Xu Shunwei 05-3020
Huang Guanghui 05-3021
Chen Jikun 05-3022
Sinapinchu 05-3023
Liu Shimei 05-3024
Zhang Qingming 05-3025
Zheng Quanguang 05-3026
Ye Da 05-3027
Li Yaohui
Luo Shengzong

06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography

Folk Beliefs and Customs (Deqing, Guangdong) · China ICH Official Project Archive

Sources

China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)

Read the official ihchina.cn record ↗

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