Hakka Earth Building

3 min read

Earth Building is also known as “Weizi” or “Tuwei” in Chinese language. It is a closed folk house in Lingnan Region. It is mainly distributed in Fujian and other places. Chengqi Building is located in Yongding County, Fujian Province, which was built in the 48th year of Kangxi Period of the Qing Dynasty (1709) as the classic masterpiece of Hakka Earth Building. Overlooking from a height, Chengqi Building looks like a huge old-fashioned disc. Four -storey building inside and outside it is distributed in concentric manner . At the center of the circle, there is ancestral hall which links hundreds of residents’ kinship and spirit. The huge earth building is huge with magni f cent appearance and peculiar shape. From the perspective of art appreciation or practical use, earth building boasts originality and creativity.

The origin of Hakka Earth Building

Since the Northern and Southern Dynasties, in order to escape from several war chaos of the northern minority , the Han Ethnic Group of the Central Plains conducted several large-scale southward migration. Some of them broke open a way through brambles and thorns, and chose mountainous residences, who were known as “Hakka”. They lived together, used the ancient Han ramming technology of the Central Plains, adopted sediment, clay , bamboo, stone and others as building materials, and constructed sturdy and closed “earth building” to prevent foreign aggression. Wall body is not only thick and solid, but also is shockproof, fireproof and waterproof, with strong defense features of tribe gathering.

Family bond in Earth Building

Earth Building in Fujian is known as “City of Family”, where dozens of families and even more families live here for several generations. A variety of required buildings and facilities are available. Courtyard center also has also ancestral hall, school, the stage and other public places. Pointing to courtyard center, smooth wide corridors are mostly paved, which can be connected to each household. In a traditional society, such layout greatly added to the cohesion of family. Guests of a family were often welcomed by the whole building.

Shapes of Earth Building in Fujian

Earth building presents ever-changing and various shapes in Fujian, which falls into round, square, polygonal and mix styles in terms of shape. Round earth building is the most commonly seen, which is described as “big mushroom sprout from the ground” and “UFO from the sky”. In Lingnan Region, the biggest earth building is “Juening Building” with diameter of 81 meters, where 1800 persons of 400 families can live. The smallest earth building is “Ruxing Building” has the diameter of 1 1 meters.

Walls of earth building

Hakka adopted raw soil, lime and f ne sand as basic materials, and sometimes add brown sugar water and sticky rice milk to agitate, knedad, pound, press, ram and many other process to make slack soil solid high walls. At the time of ramming, f r plates and old bamboo slips should be inserted into the walls like as reinforcing steel bars in modern buildings, with a view to raising carrying strength, improving overall stability and effectively avoid collapse of wall body.