Chapter 8 Two cities and cities

City walls and gates bring us into Chinese cities. In fact, in the long ancient society, almost all Chinese cities were composed of layers of walls and "doors".In ancient China, people could not conceive a city without city walls and gates, just as they could not conceive a house without a roof, doors and windows.Any real city must have walls and gates, and the taller and more numerous these walls and gates are, the higher the status and specifications of the city will be, and the more people will recognize it as a "city".Therefore, a city like Shanghai without any decent walls and gates cannot be called a "city", but may only be called a "city".

In China, "city" and "city" not only have different meanings, but also differ in status and size. What is a "city" or "city"?From the perspective of cultural anthropology, the so-called "city" or "city" is nothing more than one of the three main types of communities in human society.The three main community types are national, urban, and rural.These three kinds of communities can all be called "Yi".The so-called "country" in ancient times was small in scope and numerous in number.In the era when there were many princes, many so-called "countries" were just "city". The word "Yi" has a "mouth" on the top and a variant "person" on the bottom.There are "people" and "mouths", of course it is the community.Some people also say that the "mouth" above means a wall, a circle, and a range: "If there is land and people, it becomes a city." Anyway, this "city" with a certain range and a certain population is a "community". .

There were many kinds of communities (eups) in ancient China, and they also had many names, such as state, capital, township, and suburb, and so on.Among them, "bang" is equivalent to a country (so it is also called "bangguo"), and "du" is equivalent to a city (so it is also called "city"). "Xiang" is of course a village (so it is also called "village").In addition, "suburb" refers to a community attached to the city (suburb), "bi" refers to a community far away from the center (border), and the relationship between a community is called "neighborhood". All these words come from " Yi" (the traditional version of the township character is Congyi, which is written as "lang"; the village character is also written as "village" from Congyi), it can be seen that "Yi" is a community. However, generally speaking, "Yi" mainly refers to cities, such as " The term "duyi" is the general term for large and small cities (big is called capital, small is called yi; or "two years into a city, three years into Chengdu"). It can also be seen that cities are the most important communities.

Cities, however, are not the oldest communities.The oldest communities are villages.The countryside was transformed from the agglomeration of primitive clans. The word "(Xianglang)", no matter in bronze inscriptions or oracle bone inscriptions, is like "two people sitting facing each other and eating a gui together".That is to say, the Chinese character "(Xianglang)" means that two people are sitting face to face, with a rice bucket in the middle.Therefore, Mr. Yang Kuan said in "A New Exploration of Ancient History" that the word "xiang" is used to refer to the clan settlements that share food and drink with him.

Later, the classes were divided, the clan became a country, and the noble masters, princes, and doctors no longer shared the same rice bucket with their "people".They (with their own servants, of course) choose to live in another "Feng Shui Treasure Land", or draw a circle in the original place of residence to form a new community, and use tall and large walls to isolate this new community from the old community. open.The community delineated by the wall is called "city", also called "capital" or "Yi", and the wall is called city wall. In short, in terms of origin, the so-called "city" is the capital of ancient dynasties, The feudal lands of the feudal lords and the beneficiaries of the great officials. Or to be precise, their central areas. The places outside the city walls are called "suburbs" and "fields", and the places farther away are called "villages" and belong to rural communities. The location. A wall separates the distinction between high and low; inside and outside the gate, the high and low are different. This is a city in the traditional sense. Or to be more precise, it is a "city" in the traditional sense. It coexisted with the gate and the wall from the beginning. There is no city wall There is no such thing as a "city". Just as Xi Renlong said: "It is the walls and walls that make up the skeleton or structure of every Chinese city. "Therefore, when we suddenly find a ruined city, we can often see only the city walls, such as the ancient cities of Gaochang and Jiaohe on the outskirts of Turpan.

When cities or castles were surrounded by high walls and large gates, cities and villages became the two most important communities in ancient China.In between is the "city".The so-called "market" refers to the place where buying and selling transactions are concentrated.Because although the masters and adults are noble, they also want to eat, and they want to eat good and fresh food. It seems that paying tribute alone is not enough;The high-quality goods in the city have to go out, and the fresh products from the countryside have to come in. This requires "urban-rural mutual markets", and there must be places for "mutual markets".This place dedicated to trading is called "Shiyi".

There is no doubt that this kind of transaction requires one party to accommodate the other party.Of course, the masters would not condescend to go to the countryside to purchase, and their servants would not condescend, so naturally they could only come to the city from the countryside to trade.The villagers were originally "humble" and couldn't afford to make a name for themselves; the villagers were also "curious" and willing to go to the city.What's more, the countryside is vast and scattered, and it is not convenient for centralized trade.Therefore, the "city" is mainly located around the city, becoming a vassal and derivative of the city, and an intermediary between urban and rural areas.Its status is of course very humble.It can be seen that the difference between high and low from city to city can almost be said to be "one brought from the mother's womb.

At the beginning, the "city" as a vassal and derivative of the "city" was not a community, but a temporary place.The ancient commerce was not a regular activity, or a market every three days, or a market every five days.At this time, villagers from all over the world came to trade one after another.The trading place becomes "Shiyi". Once the trading is over, this place is nothing. Until now, many villages and towns in our country still retain this custom, which is called "going to the market". But later, trading became a regular behavior , There are also merchants who specialize in trade, and the temporary "collection" has become a regular "market", which is not only used for trading, but also for merchants to live in, and like the "city", it has its own "city". Tuweizi". Thus, the "city" has become a community.

However, this community does not dare to look beyond the "city".What surrounds the "city" is the "wall", and what surrounds the "city" is the "wall".The wall is also a low wall, which is called: "The low wall is the high wall." The city wall is tall and burly, and there are princes, nobles, high-ranking officials and celebrities living in it;Such two communities, of course, are not the same.Even the location of the "urban area" has certain rules in ancient Chinese urban planning: either in the south of the city or in the north of the city. live by breathing.However, the humble "city" finally entered the "city".In this way, "city" and "city" are finally merged into one and become "city".

However, the "city" entering the city still retains its individuality.This allows us to distinguish the "city" from the "city" at a glance: the buildings in the urban area are closed, either courtyards, high walls, or closed doors.Between these courtyards, high walls and gates, there are only roads for traffic.These roads are useless except for walking, so they can only be called "passages", not "streets".Streets in urban areas are different.It is not only for people to walk, but also for people to browse.The shops on both sides of the street also have their doors open to ensure that the products displayed inside are unobstructed.The movable door panels will be closed only after the market closes, and some (such as pharmacies) can be called open at any time.Of course, these shops have no closed walls.On the contrary, some shops will erect eaves to shelter from the sun and rain, or arbors with bamboo frames and reed mats, which are more open.This is the difference between "city" and "city", and also the difference between "street" and "road".Therefore, we can only say "shopping", "going to the street", "going to the street" (going to the market) or "market", but not "shopping", "going on the road", "hurrying to the road" or "market". "Going on the road" and "hurrying on the road" means going to other places, while "going to the street" and "hurrying on the street" means to go shopping.

In fact, the road in the city is not only a passage, but also a boundary.Together with the courtyard walls, they separate the circles one by one.It can be said that the urban area is composed of roads and roadside courtyard walls, while the urban area is composed of streets and street pavements.Because the "city" was established for commercial needs, the names of the city always show commerciality, such as rice market, vegetable market, meat market, coal market, flower market, bird market, mule and horse market, etc.They can also be used as place names, such as Caishikou, Dengshikou, Dongxihuashi Street and Huashi Dongxie Street in Beijing.The need to build a "city" is mostly political or military.So when we talk about cities, we always talk about capital cities, provincial capitals, and county towns, or they can be crowned with geographical, historical, and cultural features, such as mountain cities, river cities, ancient cities, new cities, stone cities, dragon cities, and so on.Cities and cities are different, but they are different! In fact, not only "city" and "city" cannot be compared, but also "city" and "city" are not equal. As I said before, the ancient city was mainly the central area of ​​the capital of the dynasty, the fiefdoms of the princes, and the fiefs of the doctors.Obviously, their status cannot be the same. "Zuo Zhuan" said: "The city of the Son of Heaven is nine miles away, and the feudal rites are to surrender and kill, so the Zhigong is seven miles away, the uncle is five miles away, and the man is three miles away." .That is to say, although the capital of the dynasty, the fiefs of princes, and the fiefdoms of doctors can all be called "capitals", generally speaking, only the fiefdoms of princes can be called "du" (country capital), and the fiefdoms of officials can only be called "city". (fief). Among the "capitals", only the city of the Son of Heaven can be called "Beijing".The so-called "Jing" means "artificially built high hills". ("Shuowen": "Beijing is the highest hill for people.") The city of the Son of Heaven is called "Jing", which means "extremely high". Of course, its foundation and city walls will be particularly high.Of course, there can only be one such big city in the whole world.Therefore, after the national government established Nanjing as its capital, it changed "Beijing" to "Beiping" following the established practice in the early Ming Dynasty, which means that "Beijing" must be "unique". There can only be one "Beijing", and there can be more "du".The so-called "capital" is what is commonly referred to as a "big city", and it is called "the largest city is called the capital".They are often also the old capital city, or the seat of the ancestral temple of the dynasty, called "the capital of the old ancestral temple with the ancestors".Of course, there are also those that form naturally, called "a gathering in one year, a city in two years, and Chengdu in three years".However, no matter how big "Du" is, it cannot be bigger than "Jing". If the Zhou system is used, it can only be as big as one-third of "Jing" at most.Because "Beijing" is the "capital", that is, the "first city", of course it must be "capped" as Beijingers say, or "a tripod and one city" as Shanghainese say. Beijing is both a "city" and a "capital city", and it has a "capital history of the capital" for almost 800 years, so Beijing has to be big even if it is not big.Of course, as the largest city in China, it must also have the highest wall and the largest gate.In fact, there are not only many gates in Beijing, but also large ones.The nine gates of the inner city and the seven gates of the outer city are majestic buildings with double towers consisting of archery towers and gate towers.The archery tower is like a castle condescending, but most of the gate towers are huge pavilions or palaces with two floors and three eaves (except for the east and west gates).Between the two floors is a huge urn surrounded by city walls.The urn city has a large area, and many urn cities have temples or monasteries built in it, and most of them have streets, shops and trees.This is really a gate outside the city and a city inside the gate, which can be called a spectacle in the history of architecture. It's a pity that we can no longer see this kind of spectacle. Almost all the city gates and their urns have been demolished one after another, leaving only the Zhengyangmen Gate Tower and the Deshengmen Archery Tower standing side by side amidst the traffic.But even such "incomplete" and "isolated" gatehouses are enough to make us amazed, not to mention they were erected on top of a low building with the same style back then?More than 70 years ago, Xi Renlong described the magnificence and beauty of Yongdingmen in this way: "Beside the wide moat, reeds stand upright and weeping willows dance. The outline of the city tower and the urn continues to the gate tower. Between the strong city wall and the city platform Above, the wing-like wide eaves of the gate tower seem to make it show off the sky, ready to fly. The reflections of these buildings in the water are as clear as the real thing. But when the breeze combs through the soft willow branches, the eaves of the tower begin to tremble, and the walls began to shake and shatter." I believe that no matter who reads this text, they will not be indifferent! No wonder Xi Renlong is full of respect for the gates and walls of Beijing.When he wrote about Xizhimen, he once said: "Visitors who take a speeding car to visit the Summer Palace and Xishan through this gate will involuntarily slow down their speed and drive slowly past this fragile and perishable ancient facade. Because, these Compared with the Summer Palace and the Temple of the Reclining Buddha, the scenes can provide a more real impression of the daily life in ancient China." He even thought that the city gates and walls of Beijing are the most majestic and breathtaking monuments.Because they are "vast in size, calm and vigorous, and have an air of looking down on their neighbors from a high place. Xi Renlong was too perceptive. What he saw on these city walls and gates was exactly the style of Beijing. Beijing's gates and buildings can be demolished, but Beijing's grandeur cannot be demolished.