Xufudongdu Legend
01 · Historical Records
Along the coast of Xiangshan county and Cixi city in Ningbo, Zhejiang, there have been since ancient times a great many legends of Xu Fu being sent by Qin Shi Huang to go to sea in search of immortals and the elixir of life: in 210 BCE Xu Fu led several thousand boys and girls and several hundred craftsmen and soldiers from Dapeng mountain in Cixi, formerly Xiangshan, or, some say, Penglai mountain in Xiangshan, to put to sea in quest of the elixir. The legends of the area take the place-name legends of Dapeng mountain and Penglai mountain as their core and are interwoven with the local maritime trade, fishing and salt production and the memory of migration, forming a cluster of legends rich in maritime cultural colour.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The local gazetteers afterwards almost without exception record materials on the Xu Fu legend; the Tang Penglai Temple Stele, the Song Qingyuan Siming Gazetteer and the successive county gazetteers of Cixi and Xiangshan all contain relevant records. Xu Fu pioneered the history of Chinese navigation and of cultural exchange with foreign lands and was a messenger of peace among China, Japan and Korea; the legend of his eastward voyage reflects the forebears' wish to explore the unknown world and shapes an image of Xu Fu as ambitious, learned and wise and adventurous, with great influence on the formation of the national character, and it has important historical, cultural and academic value.
Dapeng Mountain
The place in Cixi said to be where Xu Fu set sail in quest of immortals.
Penglai Mountain in Xiangshan
A mountain name in Xiangshan connected with the Xu Fu legend.
In Search of Traces at Dapeng
The materials on legend and history printed by the Cixi Xu Fu Research Society.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
Men of letters born locally or travelling there also often wrote the Xu Fu legend into their poems and prose. These two kinds of historical document provide a considerable number of recorded texts of the Xu Fu legend, supplementing the oral works handed down by word of mouth locally and transmitted to the present.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Xufudongdu Legend · Xufu Legend · Xufu Legend · Xufu Legend.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
In 1995 Cixi city set up the Xu Fu Research Society and began research on Xu Fu's eastward voyage and the collection and collation of the stories current among the people, printing such materials as In Search of Traces at Dapeng and The Road to Dapeng. Under the impact of modern media the oral telling of folk legends is neglected and the transmitters have died one after another, so that this legend is on the verge of being lost and urgently needs protection.
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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