Dali Sanyuejie
01 · Historical Records
It began in the Yonghui era of the Tang dynasty, and evolved from a temple fair; its emergence is closely related to the spread of Buddhism in Dali.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Dali March Street (Third Month Fair) is a grand traditional festival of the Bai people, its principal venue being the old town of Dali in Dali City, Dali Bai Autonomous Prefecture, Yunnan Province. The fair runs for seven days, beginning on the fifteenth day of the third lunar month and ending on the twenty-first. Each year the number of people who attend the March Street runs into the millions, with participants from all over China and from overseas. During the March Street a rich variety of ethnic cultural and sports activities are held, while goods trading and cultural exchange take place at the same time. Besides retaining the traditional trading of medicinal materials, large livestock and daily necessities, the Dali March Street has opened up a new "Foreigner Street" and a local ethnic food street, and has added markets for jewellery and jade, computer products and the like, expanding the sales scale of local famous, special, superior-quality and new products. During the March Street the old town of Dali is decked with lanterns and colours and given a fresh appearance; a "flower mountain" is erected in the market street, and every household also places flowers and plants before its doors, turning Dali — which joins the natural scenery of wind, flowers, snow and moon with its human sights — into a world of entertainment and a sea of commerce. People may both go to the fair to buy goods and take part, on the hillsides, squares and markets beside the street, in such colourful cultural and sports activities as mountain-song antiphonal singing, ethnic instrumental music performance, lantern displays, flower displays, ethnic costume shows, crossbow shooting, swings, wrestling, horse racing, dragon-boat racing and ethnic song-and-dance competitions.
The seven-day street period
Seven consecutive days from the 15th to the 21st, with trades and games rotating so visitors can return.
Opening of the traditional trade rows
The oldest three rows—medicinal herbs, livestock and daily goods—hold fixed places visitors learn to recognise.
Flowers at doorways and the street flower mountain
Lanterns and a central flower mountain fill the old town, with plants set outside every household door.
Antiphonal singing and contests before the shrine
Singing contests on the hillside and games before the shrine overlap with the worshipping crowds.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The site of the March Street is fixed in the area of the old town of Dali; during the seven days of the fair, local residents and visiting traders and mule caravans from outside pack the street full. By origin, those attending the fair come mostly from the surrounding Bai settlements of Jianchuan, Eryuan and Weishan; local residents divide up the street sections by trade, with medicinal materials, large livestock and daily necessities each occupying a section, and grain, oil and homespun cloth given special areas of their own. The ethnic food street and the jewellery, jade and computer-product markets added later were placed in the wider sections of the street, where carts and horses can pass. The cultural and sports activities spread outward along the market street: mountain-song antiphonal singing takes place mostly on the hillsides and open ground beside the street; the lantern and flower displays are set up in the open spaces at the sides of the street and before individual doorways; crossbow shooting, swings, wrestling, horse racing and dragon-boat racing each find their own venues; and the ethnic song-and-dance competitions mostly borrow the ready-made spaces in front of temples and on the squares. During the fair, religion and commerce run in parallel within the same period. Those who as a matter of routine burn incense at the benzhu temple and the Buddhist temple walk the same street as those opening up for business; the open ground before and behind the temples serves both as a place for burning incense and as a stand for watching the spectacle. This integrated pattern of temple and market is the key distinction between the Bai March Street and an ordinary fair.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The March Street integrates Bai folk custom, religion and economic and cultural exchange in one, and has irreplaceable reference value for the study of the history of the economy, culture, folk custom and religion of the Bai people of Dali.
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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