Starting from the ancient villages of Huizhou, let’s understand the “soul” of Huizhou gardens - Shuikou Gardens
For a long time, Huizhou has been an important historical and cultural place in China with significant regional characteristics. Here, the unique Huizhou culture that amazed the world was nurtured. As one of my country's three major regional scholastics alongside Tibetan Studies and Dunhuang Studies, Huizhou Studies is the interpretation and sublimation of traditional Chinese classic culture. Ye Xianen said: Huizhou culture is not only a regional culture, but also a typical example of the inheritance of Chinese orthodox culture. It concentratedly and typically embodies the essence of traditional Chinese culture. Shuikou Garden, the "soul" of Huizhou villages, is Shuikou culture's record of the collective memory of Huizhou's ancient villages.
1. What is "Shikou Culture"
In Huizhou ancient villages, each ancient village has its own "gateway", which is the "Shikou" of Huizhou villages. Shuikou is an important component of ancient villages in Huizhou. As the outlet of the village's water source, Shuikou has been widely valued by Huizhou's ancestors. The road into the village generally follows the flow of the river, and the water entrance has become an image symbol of entering the village. Therefore, Shuikou is regarded as the entrance of the village by Huizhou people.
Huizhou residents pay attention to Feng Shui when choosing locations for building villages. The traditional concept of Feng Shui dominates the shape of Huizhou villages. Shuikou is regarded as a place where the wealth of the villagers gathers and disperses. It is not only the facade of Huizhou villages, but also symbolizes the "soul" of Huizhou ancient villages and plays a decisive role. Huizhou's landform features of "surrounded by mountains and rivers" provide necessary natural conditions for the location and construction of water mouths. The layout of water mouths shows ever-changing postures due to the topography of mountains and rivers. Almost every village's water mouths have their own Architectural character and integration with its surrounding natural landscape.
At the head of ancient Huizhou villages, you can often see the Shuikou landscape carefully created by the ancestors of Huizhou. There are dense woods, exquisite bridges and pavilions, or magnificent temples and pavilions. These all demonstrate the profound and simple Huizhou Shuikou culture of the ancient villages in Huizhou, as well as the ideological concept of "harmony between man and nature", and reflect the Huizhou people's love and yearning for mountains and rivers.
2. Components of Shuikou culture
The hard-working and intelligent Huizhou people have carefully created ideal village Shuikou landscapes based on the existing natural conditions. Around almost all water mouths in Huizhou, you can see tall and lush trees, majestic ancestral halls, magnificent and mysterious temples, solemn and quiet archways, solemn and noble pagodas, and sturdy and majestic bridges. They complement the rows of Huizhou folk houses and are an indispensable part of the Huizhou village landscape. Together they outline the unique and beautiful scenery of Wannan mountain village at the entrance of the village, making people feel "people" as soon as they step into the village. The wonderful feeling of "living in the painting".
Shuikou Sand
"Shuikou Sand" refers to the mountains surrounding Shuikou, also called Shuikou Mountain. As the first village entrance to the village, the first thing that needs to be considered when choosing the location of Shuikou is the shape and direction of the mountains around Shuikou.
After the Huizhou people determined the location of the water mouth of a village, they planned and transformed the landscape around the water mouth according to the guidance of Feng Shui. Huizhou people often use artificial landscaping methods to create the Shuikou landscape, striving to integrate the artificial landscape with the natural landscape to enhance the "feng shui power" of Shuikou.
The ancients believed that if the river was straight and had no twists and turns, then the spirit of the village would be lost; if the water flow was gentle and tortuous, and could make nine twists and turns and twists and turns for dozens of miles on the beach, then It is regarded as an auspicious symbol and can gather auspicious energy. Therefore, there must be mountain rocks around the water mouth, that is, "water mouth sand", and the "sand" should be closely interlaced to prevent the water from rushing out.
Shuikou Forest
Shuikou Forest is also called Feng Shui Forest. Its construction and layout are often based on the theories of "hiding wind and getting water" and "filling gaps" in Feng Shui. Planting tall trees around the water mouth can gather the prosperity and wealth in the village in the village to prevent it from leaking out, thus strengthening the "lock key" of the water mouth to the Feng Shui of the entire village.
"Feng Shui Forest" can also be called "Evil Forest". It not only prevents the leakage of auspicious energy in the village, but also resists the evil energy from the outside world, becoming the "green barrier" of the village. When Hu Lancheng wrote about Hu Village, he also talked about the issue of location: The place where you live is also important. Not only does Jinling have dragons on the Yangtze River, and Zhongshan is surrounded by tigers, it is an imperial state, but also ordinary cities and villages. People named Wan live among the mountains and rivers of the sun and the moon. This is the wonder of having different approaches but the same effect.
Due to the influence of Feng Shui theory, most of Shuikou Forest in Huizhou have been assigned special cultural and spiritual meanings, and they are still well preserved today.
Shuikou Building Group
Complementing Shuikou Mountain and Shuikou Forest, there is also a group of buildings around Shuikou called Shuikou Building Group. People usually lay out and group scenes according to the actual environment of the village. Skilled craftsmen follow the directions of Feng Shui. Integrate Shuikou's natural features and necessary scenic spots into one, create the environment of Shuikou by building bridges, embankments, pagodas, temples, pavilions, etc., and organize scenery at the head of the village to make Shuikou a "self-contained" The beauty of nature, not the work of human beings”.
Feng Shui believes that the Shuikou buildings, mountains and vegetation together strengthen the "lock" of the Shuikou, allowing the Shuikou to gather the aura of the entire village, making up for the deficiencies of the natural environment. For example, Huizhou villages have Shuikou bridges, archways, Shuikou pavilions and other Shuikou building complexes. It not only beautifies the village environment, but also satisfies people's desire to pursue cultural and financial fortunes and other good blessings.
3. The value form in Shuikou culture
In the long history, Huizhou ancient villages were able to gradually develop into a feudal clan society where clans lived together, mainly due to the influence of several historical events. The influence of the sub-large-scale migration of a large number of noble families from the Central Plains to the south. As the "gateway" and "soul" of Huizhou villages, Huizhou Shuikou has an important value form in Huizhou villages.
Spiritual value
Huizhou Shuikou has gone through a long process from its rise, development to decline. During this process, Huizhou people regarded Shuikou as the lifeline of the village's Feng Shui, so Shuikou was filled with the good wishes of the ancestors of Huizhou for the fate of their clan and the development of future generations. Huizhou people believe that Shuikou is a symbol of the rise and fall of the fate of the whole village. Shuikou architectural landscapes such as the archway group, which have a profound spiritual enlightenment effect, not only have high artistic appreciation value, but also contain highly representative connotations of Huizhou culture, which extremely promote the morality and values of people in Huizhou's feudal society. Concepts are the embodiment of people's spiritual thoughts.
Realistic value
Huizhou people usually transform the water inlets into small water conservancy engineering facilities, and then expand them around the water inlets to form a certain-scale water environment for agricultural production irrigation. At the same time, it also solved the water problem in the village. The construction of Shuikou Garden can be said to provide services to the residents of the whole village. Huizhou gardens took the lead in history to have the nature of public gardens and became a gathering place for villagers to live and relax.
In Huizhou, a soil with profound cultural heritage, generations of Huizhou people have continuously given Huizhou Shuikou its unique spirit and symbolic meaning, which has also gradually formed a unique Huizhou Shuikou. culture and become an outstanding representative of Chinese classical gardens.