The archway in front of the mountain gate
Deng Cheng Manwen/Figure
I don't know what year or month, every 18th month of the third lunar month, in a small mountain village at the junction of West (Chong) and South (Department) Yan (Ting), people from near and far gather on a mountain called Daizhai to hold the annual Ox King Meeting.
Dalizhai, whose real name is Dalishan, is named in Yuzhen Township, Southern County, because it has built a military fortress and built a city and set up a wall. It is 628 meters above sea level, the ancient cypress is gloomy, the temple is solemn, it is a good place for local people to travel.
Deep in the mountains, the folk style is peculiar
At 8:30 a.m. on April 23, 2008, the reporter arrived at the front gate of Daizhai by motorcycle. This is the place with the highest concentration of buildings at present, pavilions, theaters, archways, halls, mountain gates, and stone stairs that reach the peak of the Ox King Hall, with a total of more than 400 steps, which make people sigh at the remnants of the ancient style of the mountain township. Under the clear blue sky, the sunshine of late spring and early summer is bustling with tourists. Climb to the top and overlook the distance, the mountains and waters are beautiful, and the cottages are like cottages.
On the same day, the reporter witnessed the warm scene of the temple fair in the mountain township. On the mountain flat under the main peak of the Great Village, full of tourists gathered from all directions, men, women and children, or on foot or by car, some of them wandering, some watching theater, some doing business, some sacrificing, almost 10,000 people came and went; At noon, the first half of the day ended, and vehicles shuttled on every road leading to Daizhai, and the trail was full of pedestrians. The popularity here is evident.
Of course, it is not only here to sing a three-day drama that attracts tourists from near and far. When you walk through the pavilion side, through the torii, along the steep stone stairs, climb to the front gate with a bang, and look down on the terrace on the second floor, the foothills of the paddy fields are like mirrors, the mountainside is full of tourists, and your head is on the top of the mountain, green smoke, firecrackers in unison. The reason why the Great Village is famous far and near is the Ox King Hall built on the top of the mountain.
The Ox King Hall is small, covering an area of 100 square meters, the front hall is open and devoid of gods, and the back hall is dedicated to the Ox King Bodhisattva and his wife.
The Ox King will sing the swan song of Kawanbei
Since ancient times, cattle have been the closest companions of southern farmers. As animal power, they alleviate the suffering of human labor, and once they are old and weak, they cannot escape the miserable situation of eating flesh and skin. The worship of the Bodhisattva of the Ox King, who is in charge of the fate of cattle, while praying for the safety of the cattle, also reflects the devotion of the peasants' atonement. Therefore, in most areas of the mainland, there are Niuwang temples and ox king meetings, but the most difficult thing to understand is that the birthdays of Dafan Bodhisattvas are unified, while the Niuwang Bodhisattva is different, Baidu check, Tibetans are the tenth day of the first month of the Tibetan calendar, the Buyi people are the eighth day of the fourth month of the lunar calendar, the Tujia family is the eighteenth day of the fourth month of the lunar calendar, and the Gelao people are the first day of the tenth month of the lunar calendar...
In the memories of local sixty or seventy-year-old elders, the ox king before liberation will be far more lively than today. At that time, in addition to the now restored buildings, there were also cat halls, ancestral halls, and the front and rear gate had heavy wooden doors, and the door panel was nailed with fist-sized copper nails. At that time, the duration of the session was seven days, from March 15 to 21. The stone stairs outside the mountain gate are full of beggars on both sides, among which there are the "eight big gangs" from Chengdu. They would not leave the whole session, and at night they would live in a col next to the cat hall, and the people in the temple would build a grass hut for them. On the day of the 18th March meeting, people from a radius of hundreds of miles were going to come towards the mountain, and those who entered the incense were discharged for several miles, and some could not wait, so they killed the roosters three or four miles away from the main peak, and then burned incense and worshiped.
Fang Zhi records that the Vigorous Village Ox King Association is the only one in northern Sichuan. Today, when the farming civilization is gradually distant, the memory of cultivating cattle can be preserved in its original form, and the Vigorous Village Ox King Meeting can be called a swan song.
Cannabis flowers still have an ancient rhyme
During the Great Zhai Temple Fair, there is a snack that is common and rare in northern Sichuan: cannabis flowers. Like pinch the crown of a rooster and drip blood, it is also related to the Bodhisattva of the Ox King.
This cannabis flower is about 50 centimeters long and nearly 10 centimeters thick, and its shape and size are exactly the same as a tool used by farmers to work for cattle - "horizontal (pronounced 'ring') burden". This is a wooden rod that is indispensable for connecting the two ropes drawn from the yoke at the tip of the ploughshare when ploughing the fields with oxen. Although this "horizontal burden" is huge and unmatched, it is also golden and bright, sweet in smell, and crispy in food. To eat it is to pray for the safety of the cow. Nowadays, cattle are becoming rarer, but this "horizontal burden" has evolved from a sacrifice to a delicacy, and is most sought-after during temple fairs.
Cannabis flowers are also sold by farmers under the mountain, while most of the people who buy cannabis flowers are outsiders, and most of the locals buy them as gifts to relatives and friends in distant places. This is in line with a famous proverb in the "Southern County Record": "The Bodhisattva of the Ox King of the Great Village - Zhao (cover) is far from shining (covering) near".
Vigorous villages have a long history
In the spring of 213 years ago, a lively wedding was held in a family surnamed Chen at the foot of this powerful village-Li Qiaoyuan, a great poet and scholar known as the "talented son of western Sichuan" in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, personally sent his son Li Chaolong here to marry the daughter of Chen Jun, a late friend and former direct subordinate to the Qinghe Daotai.
Li Qiaoyuan (1734-1820), Zixiangtang, Haoyu Village, alias Tongshan, was born in the foothills of Yunlong Mountain, Luojiang County, Deyang City, and was another literary giant in Bashu after Yang Shengan, the new capital of the Ming Dynasty. His opera treatises include "Yucun Quyu" and "Yucun Opera Tales", and "Tongshan Complete Works", "All Five Dynasties Poems", folk song collection "Cantonese Style", etc., and his "Hanhai" and "Continuation of Hanhai" collected 163 unseen books and self-published books, 852 volumes. His writings include history, geography, epigraphy, archaeology, language, phonology, poetry, calligraphy and painting, opera, folklore, agriculture, and cooking. It is not only an important historical material for the study of Bashu culture, but also a treasure in the treasure house of Chinese national culture.
According to Li's "Self-Records of Tong Shan": "In the fifty-ninth (1794) year of Jia Yin Qianlong... On March 28, he sent his son Chaolong to the southern county to Dalzhai Chen Mansion to welcome his relatives, that is, the eldest daughter of Zhan Qiang of Qinghe Province. ”
Chen Jun (1731-1789) Zi Guohua, Haoyunshan, a native of Dalizhai, an expert in water control in the Qing Dynasty, and an official to the Yongding River Daotai. Li Qiaoyuan's autobiography "Tong Shan Self-Record" in his later years recorded in detail the relationship between the two:
At that time, Chen and Li were both fellow villagers in Sichuan and officials near the capital. One year, Li "engraved 20 episodes of "Hanhai", a total of 150 parts, owed Ziren 300 gold, and did not issue the button. Chen Yunshan for redemption". It can be seen that if Li Qiaoyuan's carving of "Hanhai" made a great contribution to Bashu culture, then Chen Jun under the mountain of Vigorously Zhai was indispensable to the publication of "Hanhai".
In Li Qiaoyuan's memory, Chen Jun visited prison when he was in prison, Chen Jun saw him off when he was exiled, Chen Jun donated money when he was short of money, and Chen Jun sang peace after the poem was completed. "Otomi (1785) to Gu'an County on the first day of April, Yongding River Road Chen Yunshan (琮) stayed for two days, married Yu, Yu's second son Rong official hired the second daughter, the sixth son Guanlin hired the sixth daughter, don't go." Therefore, 5 years after the death of his old friend, he personally led his son to the former residence of the Chen family in Daizhai to complete the contract between the in-laws 9 years ago. I think that in the spring of that year, 60-year-old Li Qiaoyuan also climbed high and looked far in the Great Village to worship the ox king. It is a pity that today's vigorous village has not been able to retain the slightest ink mark of the Li family back then.
However, Dalizhai should also thank Li Qiaoyuan. Because of his records, future generations can understand the history of Daizhai and understand its preciousness.