The origin of six doors?
In order to show majesty and style, the ancient yamen opened six more doors. Later, six doors were used to refer to the government and yamen.
The reasons why Six Doors are used as a proxy for Yamen are as follows ...
Yamen is named after doors, and in this building group, all kinds of portals are of course of first-class significance. But the most important thing is the gate, instrument door and house door on the central axis.
● the origin of six doors
the only entrance and exit of the whole yamen exterior wall is the gate located in the south of the central axis. This gate is also called the "head gate". It is not a simple doorway, but a building with a roof. This kind of house-style gate is a major feature of China architecture, and its shape is strictly restricted by laws and etiquette. No matter how big the county is, the gate can only be divided into three rooms (the front room of the building, and the horizontal space between two pillars is one room). There are two black painted doors in each room, and there are always six doors, so the county government is often called "six doors". As the saying goes, "There are six doors open in the yamen, so you can't come in without money." It is commonly known that the servants and bookkeepers in the yamen are "activities in six doors."
In order to highlight the importance of the gate, there are illuminated walls in front of it, "splayed walls" on both sides, and a pair of grinning stone lions are placed at the gate. Some states and counties have upgraded the gatehouse to a two-story or three-story gatehouse, which is also a drum tower or a tower that tells the time in the whole city. The original meaning of the word qiaocheng is the same as that of the word lo, which means hope.
● Rules of East Entry and West Exit
Enter the gate, follow the brick tunnel on the central axis, bypass the screen wall, and you will reach the second gate "Instrument Gate". The instrument door is a lobby courtyard with centralized government functions, so the instrument door is also an important gateway. It is said that Yimen was originally written as a side door in the former emperor's palace. In the Ming Dynasty, the official offices were inferior to the palace, so the name of the palace side door was used to call the main entrance of the office area. Later, it was mistaken for the "instrument door", and an additional explanation was given. It was considered that entering this door should be dignified, so it was called the instrument door. The instrument door is also a three-bay room, and generally there is only one depth. The six-door fan is usually closed, and it will only be opened when Shangguan comes or the elders of the state and county officials come, and the state and county officials are here to see him off.
The instrument door is closed at ordinary times. To get in and out of the lobby yard, you have to take the specially opened side doors. The side door is often just a simple doorway, also known as "foot door" and "corner door". The novel "Awakening the World" in the Ming Dynasty mentioned that "there is a rule that every yamen enters the east and exits the west". Generally, the rule that the east side door enters and the west side door exits is exactly the same as the rule that we walk on the right now.
● Where does the back door come from
The residence of local state and county officials is at the northernmost part of the central axis of the yamen. It is their right to live here free of charge, but it is a strict obligation. The house they live in is called "inner mansion", or "official mansion", "private mansion", "middle mansion", "back mansion", "private mansion" and so on. The entrance and exit of the inner office is the northernmost "house door" of the central axis of the yamen complex.
Zhaimen is one of the most heavily guarded portals in the whole yamen complex. The house door is always locked and closed all day, and the key of the house door is often kept by the county officials themselves. The chief and scribe in the yamen serve officials only at the entrance of the zhaimen, and the private servants brought by their own officials in the zhaimen serve them. Unless absolutely necessary, the chief and scribe in the yamen must not enter the inner yamen.
The house door is also a house-style door, and the bay is still limited to less than three bays. There is a concierge in the gatehouse, guarded by the official's cronies. Hopeful holes are dug in the door leaf on the east side of the house door, and a rotating bucket is arranged on the door leaf, half of which is exposed outside the door and half of which is inside the door. When a visitor comes to visit, or a letter or official document is delivered to him, the thief guarding the gate taps the bangzi outside the house door and puts the visitor's business card or official document, letter and the like into the rotary bucket. The porter in the house door can see the people through the observation hole, turn the bucket, turn the outside half inside, and take out the things and present them to the officials.
it doesn't matter whether the inner courtyard door of the yamen is increased or decreased, but it is not allowed to open a door hole on the outer wall outside the main gate, especially not to open a small door outside the house door of the inner yamen, which leads directly to the outside of the yamen. There is a special illegal item in the assessment, which is called "opening another door". For example, the Qing Dynasty's "Annotation of Six Idioms. Official Department" owns this article: "Open another side door, and provincial officials will open another side door next to their official offices to allow them to cheat privately. It can be seen that opening another door is connected with cheating, and what we are used to calling "opening the back door" today may come from this.