Buildings
Gatehouse
Mong Tseng Wai, as in many villages the gatehouse, right of centre, is subsumed in the visual clutter of 3-4 storey Small Houses.
Gatehouses and shrines often survive, albeit recently restored or rebuilt, when much original village fabric has disappeared. This signifies the status of these buildings as social centres for meeting and prayer, expressions of the social structure which unites the villagers and excludes outsiders. The name of the village is often carved on the lintel or a stone above. When a rendered wall only could be afforded, brick or stone bonding lines were often painted on, as at Sha Kong Wai, Ha Tsuen (note 59).
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Traditional gatehouses are formed of one-bay rectangular halls, single or two-storey, the outer doorway rectangular, the inner doorway arched (note 60). Gatehouses usually have modest shrines and perhaps a stone table for offerings. These are described as devoted to the Earth God, or to White God, or to Wai Mun Kung (deity of the entrance gate), often with a niche, and/or oven below. Feng shui controlled where the shrine was placed here, that at Tin Liu Tsuen (Shap Pat Heung) being moved from the left corner to the right corner for feng shui reasons. The gatehouse would be a meeting room to discuss village matters before most villages acquired a community hall. Farming implements would be stored here for safe keeping. Public notices would be displayed at the gatehouse for villagers’ attention, a practice mimicked today by freestanding metal notice boards. Often there is a cockloft or upper floor, built of joists and planks and accessed by ladder or by stairway, and following its defensive purpose as a lookout chamber, would be a Hang Uk space for children to study and play (note 61).
Gatehouse typologies share common characteristics but vary in façade design, level changes, roof form, materiality, doorway and porthole configuration.
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Gatehouse of Muk Wu; the outside face has square headed doorway with stone lintel and circular gunports, whilst the inner face doorway is arched - the most common configuration.
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Gunports: the eyes of the village
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Openings above door height in the gatehouses are variously described as being for defensive or feng shui reasons. They are often circular, the eyes of the village. The cockloft of the gatehouse at Tai Tseng Ng Uk Tsuen (Yuen Long) is still equipped with two guns (note 62). The loopholes might be large enough to accommodate canon, but often appear too open to returned fire compared to narrow defensive slits like the wall loops at San Wai (Fanling). The larger porthole openings could also denote a later build in more peaceful times and be thus largely symbolic.
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Gates and Bolts
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The outer gateway would normally be fitted with a combination of a chained iron gate and thick wooden doors. Metal gates would be a demonstration of wealth (note 63). Bolts on the doorway enabled padlocking. They would normally be kept locked at night (note 64). Wooden ventilation bolts (tanglong) slide across gatehouse outer doorways into sockets on the opposite jamb, providing security with ventilation, and locked in place by an internal frame. This would be accompanied by a substantial panel door in the event of attack (note 65). The gatehouse of Tin Liu Tsuen (Shap Pat Heung) built as late as 1930, was fitted with these bolts, although they were removed in the 1950’s (note 66).
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The iron gate of San Wai, Fanling. Tanglong ventilation bolt frame,Tung Kok Wai.
Screens and Walls as Architectural Devices
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Elaborate timber screens are rarely seen in Hong Kong, and reserved for more prestigious architecture, ancestral halls and temples. However a few gatehouses and shrines are equipped with ceremonial screen doors comprising two leaves with lattice screen on top. These would be opened for ceremonies but otherwise closed to screen the interior of the village or shrine. At San Wai (Fanling), the double gatehouse has an inner timber screen. A common feature of the traditional Chinese house is the Spirit Wall, used to compensate for a lack of feng shui features, or an otherwise incorrect alignment, and to prevent malign spirits who could not turn corners from entering (note 67). An example of this in a walled village is the gatehouse at Tin Sam Wai (Sha Tin), backed by a solid wall, forcing the visitor to turn immediately left or right with no clear line of sight. In the event of an attack, this also seems to be a more defensible layout than the normal open axis to the shrine, so it is surprisingly unique (note 68).
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Gatehouse shrine at Tai Tseng Wai. Sketch of Fui Sha Wai gatehouse. An enclosed staircase leads to the cockloft. Below it is a shrine with images and tablets on an oven, and an adjacent seat below the rake of the stair. The outer doorway to the right has tanglong ventilation bolt sockets. The floor is granite paved.
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Notes:
59. AAB List (2018)
60. Notes on gatehouse doorways derived from AAB List (2018), eg Chik Chuen Wai, Wing Lung Wai, Shun Fung Wai, and personal observation.
61. Notes on gatehouses derived from AAB List (2018)
62. Notes on gatehouse openings derived from AAB List (2018)
63. Notes on gates derived from Ip (1995)
64. Notes on gates derived from AAB List (2018)
65. Notes on tanglong derived from Knapp (2000), and personal interview, Ng (2019)
66. AAB List (2018)
67. Notes on feng shui walls derived from Sullivan (1972), Knapp (2000).
68. From personal interview, Ng (2019); the AMO know of no other example.
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Shrine
The village shrine would have a ritual purpose, equipped with an ancestral table, ancestral tablets, images of gods and goddesses. Incense and food offerings acknowledge patrilineal descent. Ancestral worship is central to Chinese culture, and bronze vessels from the earliest times were used in ancestral ritual (note 69). Whilst notionally Daoist, the deities (shen) worshipped here are local, ancestral, or earth related, referred to as “worshipping deities” (baishen) or “superstition” (mixin), the practices of Chinese custom. They play an integral part in villagers’ lives, in ancestral worship at home, at ancestral halls or at the local shrine, in communal festivals, and in the practice of feng shui. They do not have a unifying institution, and perhaps as they are so interwoven with social and cultural life this is not necessary. Deities often tend to be transitory, becoming popular then disappearing from record, and new deities appear in urban areas as urbanisation progresses. Over 20 dieties are worshipped at the shrine of Kat Hing Wai. Shrines and gatehouses are the setting for Dim Dang ceremonies, celebrating the birth of boys in the previous year, with lanterns hung at the shrine, gatehouse and ancestral hall. Shrines are also the setting for Ghost festivals at specific days of the lunar calendar (note 70). Religious observance and practice is therefore part of daily life, the foundation of social, cultural and political organisation. Ghosts, gods and ancestors exist alongside the contemporary city, co-opted by local communities in the service of continuity of local culture and political rights. Feng shui plays a key role in this process, explaining the relationship between the local environment, ancestors and deities, and in protecting this environment from malign spirits, linking the natural world to the supernatural world (note 71).
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As buildings, shrines are often very simple purlin roof structures supported on brick gable walls of single jian width. Often a lantern beam runs from gable to gable. Sometimes a conventional row house would be converted for use as an ancestral shrine, as was the Ching Chun Fong Ancestral Hall at Shui Tsiu San Tsuen (Shap Pat Heung) in the 1940’s, and the Lam Chun Fung ancestral hall in the same village in the 1960’s (note 72)
Tuen Tsz Wai, Lam Tei, shrine along axial lane, in alignment with topography. Tai Tau Leng, the shrine is now a ground floor fit-out of a Small House; a small piazzetta formed in front of the shrine is possibly a by-product of house demolition.
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Armchair Shrines
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The ancestral axial shrine is normally supported by a network of shrines dedicated to Earth deities. These shrines would be in key feng shui locations around the village in association with significant trees, particularly banyan and camphor, protecting entrances from loss of chi, or protecting wells and irrigation works. They are known as Tai Wong (great king) and Paak Kung (great uncle). Tai Wong are characteristically of an “armchair” shape, with high back, space under the altar to burn offerings, formed in stone or concrete, sometimes shared between adjacent villages, whilst Paak Kung are often simpler and more numerous, sometimes no more than a flat stone at the base of a feng shui tree. A glazed pottery figure of the earth god might stand on the altar. Trees themselves are considered important sites for feng shui, many being protected from development. Webb (1994) refers to the shrines of Man Uk Pin (Sha Tau Kok) as a typical example, “The Tai Wong shrine on the northern arm of the fung shui wood protects the whole village. The water spirit Paak Kung, by the dam on the stream which borders the fung shui wood, ensures the safety of the drinking water supply. There are also four other Paak Kung facing each of the four directions, with trees planted to protect them, including two within the fung shui wood, and one in the middle of the village.” (note 73).
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Notes:
69. Ref eg British Museum, Bronze fang yi vessel (Shang dynasty); ref 1973,0726.1. Bronze you vessel (late Shang dynasty); ref 1936, 1118.4.
70. Notes on shrines derived from AAB List (2018), Watson+Watson (2004).
71. Notes on deities derived from Liu (2003)
72. AAB List (2018)
73. Notes on outdoor shrines derived from Webb (1994), Ho (2009).
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Temples, Ancestral and Study Halls
As the dominant clans and village clusters prospered, they built ancestral and study halls and temples for more organised worship of lineage ancestors, whose tablets were retained there. The halls also provided a meeting place to discuss village matters until community halls were built typically in the late 20th century (1986 at Shui Tsiu San Tsuen). These large temples, ancestral and study halls, two- or sometimes three-hall complexes built around courtyards, could not easily be accommodated intra-muros, so were located as far as possible within multi-village clusters. They themselves were quasi-defensive buildings, with high blank external walls and sturdy gateways, but were still prone to attack; at Ping Kong the ancestral hall was rebuilt within the village after the old one outside was burnt down in a clan feud. The exceptions to this rule are the larger Hakka villages, where ancestral hall and temple formed an essential part of the village interior central axis.
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The centre of communal life, the ancestral hall is usually the most prominent landmark in the village landscape, and the most ornamented, an indication of clan wealth and status. Villagers claim status by the number of halls in their ancestral hall; a 3-bay 3-hall building would be the highest status in Hong Kong. It is here that hybrid loadbearing and framed structures are found, with decorative tuofeng structural brackets and kuilong ridge ends. Study halls were built for the education of family descendants, and so are dedicated to a specific clan and contain space for worship of ancestors, an altar with ancestral tablets to the rear, aswell as spaces in the front hall for teaching. Most study halls were built c1870-1920, providing the teaching of Chinese classics, so enabling students to sit the Imperial Civil Service Examination needed to obtain a position in the Qing government, a valuable social mobility available with the privileges of elite clan membership (note 74). Ancestral and study halls are sometimes located within subservient or satellite villages, interspersed within the rows of houses, such as the Ho’s at Kuk Po Lo Wai (Luk Keng), but these tend to be more modest structures similar to house typologies of one jian width, and are sometimes house conversions (note 75).
Tang Ancestral Hall, Ha Tsuen, like most temples, study halls and ancestral halls a series of linked courtyards and halls within a defensive structure.
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Notes:
74. Notes on halls derived from Ip (1995), Ho (2008), AAB List (2018), Ho (2009), Watson+Watson (2004), and from personal interview, Ng (2019). Tablets, wooden stakes around 300mm long, are assumed to retain a portion of the ancestors spirit or shen (Watson+Watson).
75. Notes on halls intra-muros derived from AAB List (2018), Watson+Watson (2004).
Houses
The Traditional House to 1972
The array of 3-4 storey concrete apartments found along most village lanes is occasionally interrupted by ancient single storey brick houses with tiled pitched roofs. Usually a small courtyard is added to the front of the house enclosed by a wall with an entrance doorway in the centre. In the tropical climate of Hong Kong, vernacular architecture responds to high temperature and humidity, and heavy rainfall (note 75). Roofs pitch to discharge rainwater and overhang, courtyard spaces are small, paths are devised for natural ventilation, daylight is diffused through grilles rather than directly sunlit, and houses are clustered together so that the streets themselves are shaded and the houses benefit from mutual cooling. Fresh air natural ventilation is vital in this climate to purge moisture in the air before it can condense on internal surfaces and cause mildew.
Traditional village houses are single storey, usually with enough height for a loft deck. This form would offer less resistance to destructive summer typhoon winds and pounding rain carrying abrasive salt and sand (note 76). A south facing house orientation was auspicious and practical, benefitting from prevailing sea breezes. The orientation of the village ensemble took precedence however, and other factors relevant to topography and feng shui might take priority, the house entrances generally facing the same way as the whole village entrance (note 77).
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Vernacular domestic architecture of South China is based on the repetition of simple forms, constructed of grey bricks with loadbearing walls supporting pitched roofs of timber rafters on round purlins with clay pantiles. This architecture has remained unchanged for centuries, and therefore is very difficult to date, there being no stylistic or material difference between a house built in 1600 from one built in 1900. Vernacular doulang houses were built at Hakka Wai in 1910-20, houses built at Tin Sam Tsuen (Pat Heung) in the 1920’s are described as “Qing vernacular”. Many listings are reliant upon adhoc writings sometimes centuries apart (note 78). This stylistic uniformity of traditional village houses will have suited, and may be a product of, the working of itinerant gangs of masons and craftsmen (note 79).
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Traditional brick house as punctuation in village lane of 3-storey apartments, Tung Kok Wai, Fanling. Model of Kam Tin in Hong Kong Museum of History; houses in rows.
Dimensions: 1 to 3 jian typologies
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Houses were constructed to a module (jian), which informed the layout of the village and its component parts. A typical village house might be one module wide (note 80). Whilst of no fixed dimension, a jian represents the span of a purlin between two walls or columns, therefore the availability of local tree sections, typically 3.6-3.9m in the Guangdong area (note 81). It may also vary in response to available site dimensions being a product of wall-first-houses-second sequencing. This unit was additive or modular, so buildings could be composed of any number of jian, though odd numbers were considered auspicious and provided for a central entrance and courtyard, together with rear main room on the central axis in which was a table for display of ancestor tablets.
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In the classic description houses were built to a 3-bay plan, corresponding to the typology at Sam Tung Uk museum and as reconstructed in the Museum of History, planned around a small courtyard with an entrance gate, private from all other families, off which rooms were entered. Kitchen and stores would be to the side, detached to separate cooking heat from living spaces, bedrooms to the rear either side of a central living/dining space. The central room would have a ritual aswell as secular purpose, equipped with an ancestral table, ancestral tablets, images of gods and goddesses, incense and food offerings acknowledging patrilineal descent. Each household would have a table altar dedicated to ancestral and earth worship, such as “Master of the Site (dizhu), Heaven God (dangtian), Kitchen God (zaojun) and Door God (menguan). The table would be provided with tablets representing usually domestic ancestors, incense sticks and offerings (note 82). Storage would be on hooks or shelves rather than on the ground. A precedent is the sanheyuan house typology, a 3-jian layout found throughout Guangdong province, with standardised module dimensions but widely variable compositions (note 83). The layout of the individual dwelling thus mimics the hierarchical organisation of space evident in the whole village plan.
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3-jian house plans (L) sanheyuan houses in Guangdong (R) 3-jian doulong house, Law Uk, Hong Kong. A 3-jian house reconstructed in Hong Kong Museum of History.
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However, it is clear from site visits that this 3-bay plan is an ideal in name only, as most surviving houses are of one or less frequently two bays, some have the forecourt and lower outbuildings, some not. Other typologies would be the one-hall-one-room, or one-hall-one-courtyard plans. In these simple single jian versions, the kitchen with a chimney and bathroom would occupy the open courtyard, the hall comprising a taller living room in front of a lower bed-space with a cockloft over (note 84). 9.5m X 3.5m appears to be a normal approximate plot (bay) size, as the bays at Sam Tung Uk museum, but this describes the full extent of the dwelling, not one of three bays (note 85). The double pitched outbuildings of Sam Tung Uk appear lavish, and a far more common arrangement seems to be a simple lean-to roof falling back in toward the main block, perhaps with a drainage gap in between to catch rainwater. Often this lean-to appears to have been replaced at some stage with a concrete flat roof or with a corrugated steel extension of the main roof pitch. Sam Tung Uk incidentally has house-wall typologies encircling the core of halls and 3-jian houses, humbler two-bay dwellings added later as the family flourished, significantly at the perimeter forming the first line of defence; an example of village expansion flexibility to fit family size.
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Houses were clearly of different sizes, the more affluent higher status being larger. Often the 3-bay starter home was frequently subdivided to accommodate an extended family within the village boundary, or where there was a lack of primogeniture (first born son) (note 86). The number of bays was also regulated by sumptuary laws according to the rank of regional officials. So, houses in Beijing Forbidden City extend to 11 jian, and in Guangdong province to 5 jian, but there were no high enough ranking officials in Hong Kong in the Ming dynasty to command houses of more than 3 jian (note 87). So the Hong Kong walled village is characterised by simple enclosure of space, by straightforward economy of means, expanded through repetition of the jian unit, the basis of all Chinese architecture, assembled to form a grouping. It echoes the chequerboard districts of urban mainland China, confirming the Taoist expression, “the Tao produced one, one produced two, two produced three, three produced all beings” (note 88) This is architecture entirely appropriate to the imminent need to establish a home and livelihood with limited time and resources.
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Sha Po Tsuen, houses in rows, with no front courtyard space. Shui Tsiu San Tsuen, 2-storey forebuilding in front of courtyard.
Houses with forecourt. Ho Sheung Hung Nam Pin Wai, the courtyard portion rebuilt in 1961. Ping Kong with later modifications of side door causing structural issues, and asbestos courtyard roof covering.
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A typical New Territories village house, plan, section and isometric of a single jian house.
Courtyard
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Houses were oriented towards the front of the village (note 89), usually with a frontal courtyard. The doorway to this space would include a raised threshold, which must be stepped over. Doorways would be simple portals or occasionally grander statements with hooded canopies, calligraphy and ornamental panels. Openings from courtyard to rooms are simple doorways, as at Sam Tung Uk. Knapp (2000) notes the use of filigree timber screens to courtyards in southern China, often intricately carved, but in the New Territories these appear to be reserved for the more important temples and ancestral halls. Knapp (2000) also notes the “bipolarity” of the courtyard, a rigid defined building boundary contrasting with the openness of the sky, a spatial balance correlated to the Chinese characters yin and yang.
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Courtyard ovens at Sheung Wo Hang and Mong Tseng Wai. House interior looking through the courtyard to the family shrine at Muk Wu.
House section showing ventilation airflow via the courtyard, driven by oven extract, stack effect, shaded lanes and water cooling.
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Courtyard as Environmental Moderator
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Solar control and natural ventilation were important factors in the design of dwellings. Roofs overhang to shade the walls, windows are limited to small high openings, and courtyards encourage ambient breezes into the building. Location of the kitchen oven to the side of the entrance court would not only keep the heat and smell of cooking separate, but initiate stack effect ventilation through the house, whereby as the hot air rises above the oven it draws cooler air in through the rear of the dwelling.
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In order to maximise shaded areas, this courtyard space (tianjing) is usually small in area in contrast with those of northern China, occupying less than 20% of the house floor area. It was a source of air for ventilation and water from the roof. The sunken floor provided a catchment area for rainwater, a drainage sump in heavy rain, and thereby a source of cooling for the interior. The courtyard drain point would be strictly determined by feng shui; water represents money, so you don’t want it to drain away unnecessarily (note 90). The courtyard-to-house external wall abutment is often a straight joint, for example at Tai Wai Tsuen, Shui Tsiu San Tsuen, Mai Po Lo Wai. This may indicate building at different dates, or a partial rebuild, a sensible brickwork movement joint and/or simply different construction of the courtyard wall (note 91).
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Loft Deck
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A loft deck of wood boarding on rafters was normally built into the rear of the house, as can be seen at Sam Tung Uk museum, used for additional bed space or storage, sometimes with a wooden screen to the main space. This might be accessed by a fixed stairway or movable ladder resting on a stone base at ground level (note 92).
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House cocklofts at Ma Tseuk Leng and Sam Tung Uk Museum.
Feng Shui House
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Examples of feng shui principles at work in house design include (note 93):
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Programming, to begin work on propitious days
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Front door must not extend beyond the roof
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Two houses should not have opposite doors
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Protective tablets may be necessary
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House typologies share common characteristics but vary in façade design, materiality, door and window configuration, and the accretion of extensions over time. The main differ is without and with courtyard.
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Man Uk Pin, the gable of a surviving courtyard house, those of its foreground neighbours reduced to rubble. To the left are modern houses of 2-4 storeys, and to the right are traditional buildings which are mostly vacant and decaying.
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Notes:
75. The HK climate in summer is subject to heavy rains and typhoons; Typhoon Wanda (1962) and Monsoon Trough (1966), caused widespread damage. Temperatures rarely fall below freezing.
76. Notes on climate derived from Knapp (2000)
77. But by no means always; for instance the twin villages of Tai Hang Lo Wai and Chung Sum Wai have houses running perpendicular to the gatehouse-shrine axis, several villages have perimeter houses oriented perpendicular to the edge.
78. Notes on dating derived from AAB List (2018). The listing for Tang Ting Kwai Ancestral Hall (Pat Heung) states, “probably built between 1688 and 1818.” The construction year of Muk Kiu Tau Tsuen (Shap Pat Heung) gatehouse is described as “cannot be determined”.
79. Hase (1992) in Knapp (ed) Chinese Landscapes, the Village as Place, University of Hawaii Press, quoted in Webb (1994).
80. Notes on jian derived from Wang (1998) and Knapp (2000). Ip (1995) suggests the planning module to be a keng wa (literally column of roof tiles), the house being 9 to 18 keng wa wide.
81. Figures from Knapp (2000), Holmes (2000).
82. Notes on household deities derived from Liu (2003), Watson+Watson (2004).
83. Notes on houses derived from Sam Tung Uk Museum, and notes from Sullivan (1972), Knapp (2000), Knapp (1990), Ho (2007). Ho states “A typical size house would measure 11.1m x 9.3m.” - this for a 3-bay house, giving a bay size 3.7m x 9.3m. From site visits and mapping, a more accurate norm for village houses appears to be an average of 3.5m x 8.8m, and note this is variable.
84. Notes on typologies derived from AAB List (2018)
85. Hase (1999) gives a plot size of 23ft (7m) x 8ft6 (2.6m) for Nga Tsin Wai, adding also that even this size was often subdivided to houses of 100sqft (10m2).
86. Notes on subdivision derived from Ip (1995), Knapp (1990)
87. Notes on sumptuary laws from personal interview, Ng (2019).
88. Cheng, "History of Chinese Philosophy" (1997), quoted in Edelmann (2008).
89. Notes on orientation derived from Wang (1998)
90. Notes on courtyards derived from Knapp (2000), and Knapp (1986), with the note that courtyards occupy 40% of house floor area in the north of China. Drain point note from personal interview, Ang (2019). Although the courtyard vent path is conjectural, it is based on common assumptions in architectural practice; scope for research.
91. A movement joint is recommended 6m from a corner wall in the UK.
92. Notes on lofts derived from Knapp (1986), Boyd (1962), and personal observation.
93. Notes on feng shui derived from Edelmann (2008).
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