or centuries, it was not uncommon for more than 200 people of the same clan to live under one roof in mountainous areas of East China's Fujian Province and South China's Guangdong Province. Their descendants still follow the tradition, with their earthen-rammed multistorey buildings remaining intact.
On the vast Loess Plateau in northwestern China, people dug their houses into the dry land and ravines. Popular in Gansu, Shaanxi and Shanxi provinces and part of Henan, where rainfall is scarce, these residences are cool in summer and warm in winter.
Meanwhile, in the prosperous areas of Anhui and Shanxi provinces that boasted a great number of business people and bankers in the old times, exquisite courtyard-style residences are scattered around, representing a unique style of village architecture.
Chinese people have adapted their architecture to their particular environment with a wide array of styles and forms. And Chinese architecture has also been shaped by the country's 56 distinct ethnic groups.
Apart from the splendid imperial palaces, gardens and tombs, numerous village houses across the country show their sheer beauty.
However, fast economic development has encroached on the traditional way of life. Villagers and their village culture and architecture face a dilemma - let the tradition die or try in vain to maintain it the way it has always been.
The situation also worries architects, scholars and tourists. Worried about the extinction of the unique folk architecture, some experts are trying to record as much of the fast-disappearing architecture with their cameras and books as quickly as possible.
Tourists are also disappointed when they see many unique centuries-old villages being replaced by plain buildings covered with glazed tiles.
With the increasing population, villagers have to squeeze themselves ever more tightly into their once well-planned villages. They try to get rid of their centuries-old dwellings with poor living conditions when they become better off. Tearing down the old buildings, they erect new structures of two or three storeys that more often than not turn out to be awkward dwellings rather than the impressive villas for which they had hoped.
Preventing old villages from vanishing and integrating tradition with contemporary change have become long-term projects for many architects and scholars and the government.
"We have to race against time, bulldozers and disasters in order to meet the changes," said Chen Zhihua, professor with the Beijing-based Tsinghua University's architecture school. "And we must be faster than the changes." Chen spent more than 10 years recording ancient villages across the country. Together with his colleagues Lou Qingxi and Li Qiuxiang, Chen has published a series of books focusing on Chinese village architecture.
Every spring and autumn, the three professors would take their students to rural areas to search for unique villages and makes notes about their distinguishing buildings and customs.
More than a place to live
China has been an agricultural country for more than 2,000 years, with a civilization rooted in the countryside, Chen said. "The numerous villages have passed on the spirit of the nation," Chen said.
A house in China was far more than a place to live - it was a symbol of its inhabitants' social status and reflected social differences.
Courtyard-style dwellings were typical of Chinese architecture. Large or small, each room in the dwelling had its own function. The first building, for example, had a room for receiving guests, a room for the man in charge of the family's finances, and a room for the doorman.
But courtyard-style dwellings differed from place to place while also showing strong prejudice against women in feudal society. In Anhui and Shanxi provinces, where women from wealthier families usually did not go out to work, the courtyard dwellings often kept women from entering the main yard or the first building.
However, in coastal areas such as Fujian and Guangdong, there were not so many taboos against women since they were also the family's main breadwinners.
"By recording the villages, we have also got a closer look at Chinese culture," Chen said.
"However, it was very difficult for us to do the project. Much of what we recorded several years ago has become history."
Chen said he still remembered the day when he saw the ruins of a private school from the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) in Furong village by the Nanxi River in East China's Zhejiang Province. It was in the spring of 1989, when Chen and his students were doing research there.
"I thought I could record it when I returned that autumn because I ran out of film," Chen recalled.
One week after they left, the structure was destroyed by fire.
What Chen and his colleagues tried to do over the years was find valuable villages to record information about them. "We hope more people will notice and protect them," Chen said.
Thanks to Chen's work, several old villages by the Nanxi River have been put on the State protection list, including the villages of Yuyuan and Zhuge.
"I know the villagers want to improve their living environment," Chen said. "We could move the villagers to a neighbouring new site and keep the old village as it is."
Fortunately, the local people of Hongcun in Xidi County, Anhui Province, have already followed this way of protecting the old village.
Hongcun was added to the list of world heritage sites in 2000 by the World Cultural Heritage Committee of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. The village boasts 158 residential buildings that hark back to the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties. Nearly 140 are still in good shape. They are typical Huizhou residences, with the principal rooms and adjoining rooms on two storeys built around a central skywell. From the outside, they seem to be made of just white walls and grey tiles. Only tiny windows open onto the side of the houses facing the street.
Although new buildings account for 30 per cent of the village's total area, these are either cleverly concealed or far removed from the old ones. Some villagers have moved out of their ancestral homes to make way for tourists. Others still live there and have opened parts of their home to visitors.
The local authorities are buying ancient houses from those owners who prefer to move into new buildings.
The authorities only allow villagers to rebuild their houses nearby rather than inside the village so that they do not overshadow the ancient dwellings, said Hu Rongsun, head of Yixian County's cultural heritage bureau.
However, not many old villages have been as lucky as Hongcun. "More and more are dying, particularly in the past 10 years," said Chen.
Old house versus new life
Shan Deqi, a professor from Tsinghua University's architectur school, said: "Architects consider the old villages the cream of Chinese traditional residential architecture. Scholars have discovered that the old villages embody a distinctive culture while local governments have realized that they can draw tourists like magnets. But the residents want to change their lifestyle, to make it more comfortable, healthier and more modern."
He stressed that it was the building materials that decided the architectural culture.
The Chinese are quite adroit in adapting their architecture to their particular environment, using a wide range of styles and materials. People in the north used to rely on stone, timber and earth, while those in the south chose timber, bamboo and all kinds of grass as their main construction materials.
According to Shan, most of the remaining old villages across the country were formed during the Ming and early Qing dynasties, when China's population was around 100 million. Today, the figure has grown to 1.3 billion.
"It would be impossible for people to rely on natural materials to build houses," said Shan. He added that the government has established regulations to control the use of timber and earth.
"When the materials changed, the structure has to be changed. Life is changing. That's why the traditional architecture has to change," he said.
He noted that traditional architecture served a certain place and a certain period. "Whenever conditions are different, it will be replaced by a new method," he said.
"I don't think new buildings will lose their elegance as long as people realize how to make them attractive in a new way and how to plan new villages," Shan said.
(China Daily WEN JIAO 02-22-2003)
