Research On The Temple Landscape Along The Great Wall In Northern Shanxi During The Ming And Qing Dynastie

The temple landscape is a place used by the ancients to worship ancestors,sages,gods of famous mountains and rivers,Buddhist and Taoist spirits,etc.Through the joint construction of the government and the public for thousands of years,it carries a abundant folk belief culture and has become an important "glue" in ancient Chinese society.Exploring the development process of the formation and changes of temple landscapes along the Great Wall in northern Jin is of profound value for understanding the social and cultural landscape of northern Jin.During the Ming and Qing Dynasties,the area along the Great Wall in northern Shanxi was complex and variable in terms of natural environment.The diverse topography and hydrological conditions have laid a good foundation for the generation and development of diverse settlements.However,due to the unstable climate,droughts,locust plagues and other disasters occur frequently in the region,which have brought huge impacts on agricultural production and people’s lives.In terms of human environment,the settlements along the Great Wall in northern Shanxi have been deeply influenced by the border environment since the beginning,and have a strong military color;in the early and mid-Ming Dynasty,the settlements in this area were mostly military towns,Weisuo,passes or stockaded-villages.It developed rapidly under the impetus of military garrison and reclamation;along with the relaxation of the relationship between the inside and outside of the Great Wall in the late Ming Dynasty,the military settlements in this area gradually got rid of the confinement of the city wall,and most of them became life-like in the early and mid-Qing Dynasty.After the germination of the pre-Qin period,the orderly development of the Qin,Han,Wei,Jin,Southern and Northern Dynasties,and the prosperity and expansion of the Tang,Song and Yuan dynasties,the folk beliefs along the Great Wall in northern Jin have accumulated a profound cultural heritage;by the Ming and Qing dynasties,the area had formed a relatively complete system of worshipping gods,and the belief in sages,nature,and Buddhist and Taoist spirits is enriched.Under the guidance of a stable sacrificial policy,the temple landscapes along the Great Wall in northern Shanxi during the Ming and Qing Dynasties were constructed in an orderly manner;at the same time,with the extensive participation of the people,the temple landscapes were also closely related to the production and life of the people.The general attention of the official and the public has promoted the rapid development and prosperity of folk beliefs in the region.Based on the local chronicles,the author divides the temples in this area into military and war and production and life temples from the perspective of the functions of the temples.The former includes Chenghuang Temple,Cuifujun Temple,Beiyue Temple and other functions of "protecting the city and Anbang",and the temple landscapes such as Zhenwu Temple,Qiyu Temple,Guansheng Temple and other functions of "helping and praying for blessings";the latter includes Xiannong The altar,the Dragon Temple,the Bawa Temple,etc.are oriented to "Fu Fuminfeng",and the Wenchang Temple,the Temple of the Virgin,and the Bixia Zhenjun Temple are oriented to "educate the people".A variety of ancestral temple landscapes are distributed in the vast area along the Great Wall in northern Shanxi.At the political district level of the settlement,a large number of ancestral temples are distributed in the settlements at the county level and below;at the location of the settlement,ancestral temples are concentrated.It is distributed in the settlements formed along the border wall and along the main communication lines in this area,among which Daixian and Naoxian are the most typical;while in the more remote settlements,the number of ancestral temples is relatively small.Specific to the spatial and temporal distribution of various ancestral temple landscapes,many ancestral temple landscapes with the function of "protecting the city and Anbang" were born with and built for the city.Together with the city wall and government offices,they laid the foundation for the stable development of the settlement.The temple landscapes with the function of "helping the war and praying for blessings" were mostly built during military confrontation and conflict,and they were mostly located in the geographical locations of the settlements facing the threat of the enemy.A large number of temples and temples have been built and renovated during the period of peace and stability,which are oriented to "health for the people" and "education of the people." Among them,the landscapes of the ancestral temples that pray for abundance and ensure income and the cultural and educational ancestral temples mostly comply with the official sacrificial ceremonies and have a regular layout,or are built in the "feng shui treasure land" on the outskirts of the city,or are built with government offices and temples and other buildings;The landscapes of ancestral temples and ancestral temples are mostly built by officials and civilians.The geographical distribution characteristics of ancestral temple landscapes in the former are closely related to the overall distribution pattern of disasters,while the ancestral temple landscapes in the latter are mostly built in places near the settlement.As far as the information on the construction of ancestral temple landscapes along the northern Shanxi line in the Ming and Qing dynasties was compiled by the author,the ancestral temple landscapes of military warfare and production and life have experienced a process of change.Among them,a large number of ancestral temple landscapes of military warfare were built in the early and mid-Ming Dynasty,while the late Ming Dynasty to the mid-Qing Dynasty was the period when the ancestral temple landscapes of production and life appeared on a large scale.At the same time,in the process of localization and living of military settlements,the military functions of temple landscapes have gradually expanded or transformed,which also makes the original military war temple landscapes play more roles in the production and life of the people.function.The changing process of the ancestral temple landscape along the Great Wall in northern Shanxi in the Ming and Qing Dynasties essentially reflected its profound interaction with the regional society: on the one hand,the geographical environment of mountains and waters and the perennial social environment of the frontiers affected the ancestral temple landscape.On the other hand,the temple landscape also provides an important place for the development and evolution of the social economy and diversified social customs dominated by border trade.The interaction between ancestral temple landscape and regional society also promotes the formation of the settlement’s sacred space to a large extent,laying the foundation for the construction and improvement of the settlement value system in northern Shanxi today.