The wind is shining and the weather is clear.
This is a day more than 900 years ago, that is, during the reign of Huizong of the Northern Song Dynasty, and the location was in front of the gate tower of Bianjing, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty. Although it was nearly dusk at this time, the avenue leading to the front of the city tower was still full of people, pushing carts, carrying burdens, riding horses, and making sedan chairs.
A young scholar in his twenties, wearing a square scarf on his head, wearing a cyan gown, a moon-white satin silk around his waist, and a folding fan in his hand, was walking slowly on the moat bridge, looking up as he walked, carefully observing every corner of the city tower.
You may wonder who this boy is, why is he looking here, and who are he looking for?
It turned out that this son's name was Zhang Zeduan, and he was a painter at the Northern Song Dynasty Royal Academy of Painting. He was ordered by Emperor Huizong of the Song Dynasty Zhao Ji to paint the scenery of the entire Bianjing City on one painting. This task is not simple, although Zhang Zeduan's painting skills are superb, especially good at painting "boundary paintings", that is, he is very good at painting cities and buildings, but this time the task is to paint the entire city on a huge canvas, such a difficult task he dare not take lightly. Since receiving the task, he has to get up early every day, go to Bianjing City to observe on the spot, firmly remember the houses, boats, cars, shops and other places everywhere, and then draw sketches to prepare for the painting of this super large picture.
No, he came out early again today. It has been ten days since he received the task, and he has seen almost all the places in the city, and today he is going to take a closer look at this castle tower one last time, keep it firmly in his mind, and go back and start painting.
Through Zhang Zeduan's eyes, let's also take a good look at this tall and majestic city tower.
If we look down from above, the roof of this castle tower has four slopes, and there is a ridge in the middle, and this kind of roof is called "the top of the palace". There are many types of roofs in ancient Chinese architecture, the most important of which are the top of the palace, the top of the rest mountain, the top of the hanging mountain and the top of the hard mountain. The top of the palace is like the city tower in front of Zhang Zeduan, a positive ridge in the middle, four vertical ridges, and there are four sloped roofs under the ridge, which is the highest level of roof form in ancient Chinese architecture.
Slightly lower than the top of the palace is the top of the rest of the mountain, this is on the basis of the top of the palace, the four vertical ridges on all sides are not down at one time, but "rest" for a while, so there are four vertical ridges, four ridges, plus the main ridge, a total of nine ridges are formed, so it is also called "nine ridge top". The two sides of the summit form a triangular surface called "mountain flower", which is also a place where great attention is paid to decoration on the summit of the mountain.
In addition to the two highest levels of roofs, the top of the temple and the top of the mountain, the hard top and the top of the hanging mountain are also often used. The top of a hard hill is the roof with a positive ridge and slopes on both sides. The other parts of the hanging mountain top are the same as the hard mountain top, except that the eaves on both sides of the mountain face are protruding from the gable. Hanging mountains and hard mountains are the two simplest and most basic forms of roofing, which were used by ordinary people when building houses in ancient times. Of course, local tyrants are arbitrary, and rich people's homes will also use this kind of roof.
There is also a kind of roof, called the spire, which is the kind of spire we often see on pavilions and towers, without a normal ridge, with four or more vertical ridges, and a round treasure roof in the middle.
In addition, there is a flat top, a roll roof without a ridge, a helmet-like helmet, and so on. These different roofs form a large family of roofs, which gives this majestic and magnificent scenery to traditional Chinese architecture.
Zhang Zerui looked up and carefully observed, the two giant owls at the top of the roof were tall and mighty, and after the sunlight, they reflected a warm halo, making him have to squint.
At the two ends of the ridge of the roof of ancient Chinese buildings, two huge animal heads are usually placed, and the mouth is opened to make a swallowing ridge, and these two animal heads are called "owl (sound eating) kiss", also called "swallowing spine beast". These two owls come from ancient Chinese myths and legends. Legend has it that the dragon gave birth to nine sons, each of which is different, in these nine sons, there is a man called the cockpit (sound eating) kiss, the dragon head and fish body, the nature is good to look around, this is the predecessor of the owl kiss, that is, we just said, stay on both sides of the roof of the ancient Chinese building on both sides of the ridge of the two huge beast heads.
According to historical records, these two guys began to appear in the Jin Dynasty. Legend has it that there is a fish in the sea that can stir up wind and waves, and its tail is very similar to the tail of an owl ("owl" is a bird), so ancient craftsmen put its tail on the roof to prevent fire and lightning with its power. To put it bluntly, it is an unreliable "fire protection measure" in ancient times.
After reading the owl kiss, we look down along the four vertical ridges, at the end of the vertical ridge, there is generally a row of small beasts squatting on the ridge, what are these small beasts used for, what are they called?
These cute little beasts are the most interesting places on the roofs of ancient buildings, and their names are "spine beasts". When I was a child, when I was uncomfortable at home, my mother often counted me down: "Look at you are so idle". This "five ridges and six beasts" refers to the five ridges and six ridged beasts on the roof.
Although the Song and Liao buildings have not yet developed perfectly, and are more like the shape of the characters, it is the basis of the subsequent Ming and Qing Dynasty buildings.
If you have been to the Forbidden City, then you will see rows of spine beasts squatting on the roof of each hall of the Forbidden City. The roofs of ancient Chinese buildings were strictly divided into hierarchies, and the number of spine beasts on the roofs was also directly related to the ranks, and three, five, seven or more were generally placed according to the ranks. The number of spine beasts on the roof of the Taihe Hall of the Forbidden City is the largest, there are ten, respectively: 1, dragon, 2, phoenix, 3, lion, 4, seahorse, 5, heavenly horse, 6, fish, 7, slyph, 8, hedgehog, 9, bullfighting, 10, Xingshi.
Dragons, phoenixes, lions, Pegasi, and seahorses needless to say, they are all powerful characters who go to the sky and the earth, and turn over rivers and seas. Let's mainly look at the fox, the pig and the xingshi.
In seventh place, the fox (sound sour mud) has a lot of origins. In ancient Chinese mythology, the Monkey was one of the nine sons of the Dragon, and in Buddhism, the Monkey was the mount of Manjushri Bodhisattva, also known as the Golden Monkey or the Green Lion. Legend has it that the fox likes fireworks, so the image generally appears on the incense burner. When we travel to Buddhist temples in various places, we often see the head of a beast lying on the leg of the incense burner, which is a sinister one.
What is it? It is also a kind of mythical beast in ancient Chinese mythology, with a horn on its head, which can distinguish right from wrong. Legend has it that if two people are in a dispute over right and wrong, the pig will appear, use a single horn to defeat the quibble, and then ...... Of course, it doesn't eat people, it just wants to tell the unreasonable quibbling: don't talk nonsense, I'm here to see. Therefore, the pig who likes to be a referee is a symbol of fairness and justice in traditional Chinese culture, and it is also a symbol of ancient Chinese justice.
Let's talk about the last line of line. Why is it called Xingshi? It's because it's ranked in the top ten. Isn't the appearance of Xingshi a little familiar? Sharp beak, monkey gills, eagle claws, wings on the back, and holding a vajra pestle, isn't this Lei Zhenzi? If you think about it carefully, Lei Zhenzi is also the embodiment of the god of thunder, and in ancient Chinese buildings dominated by wooden materials, it is indeed necessary to have a security captain who resembles the god of thunder to carry out the security work of fire prevention and lightning protection. But you may have to ask, isn't it enough to be called Lei Zhenzi directly? Why bother to come up with another name? Well, then guess why I'm called Qian Jianghu?
As he rose higher and higher, Zhang Zeduan rubbed his eyes, lowered his head and rested for a while.
He was born in Dongwu, Shandong, came to Beijing as a child, first studied hard, and later specialized in painting, especially fond of painting the scenery in the city such as "Zhouche City Bridge", that is, the full-time "boundary painting". His style was in a class of his own and was very popular with the emperor. This time, the emperor asked him to draw the entire Bianjing City, also to test his ability.
Zhang Zeduan rubbed his stiff neck as he walked towards the city gate. Pedestrians hurrying by. A tall caravan of camels walked past him, and the camel bells rang, raising a puff of dust. He walked past the city gates, turned his back to the sun, and continued to look back at the tower. On the roof of the castle tower, rows of tiles are neatly arranged, like armies waiting to be reviewed.
If you look at the neat tiles on the roofs of Chinese buildings as a line, then standing at the front of the whole line is this round little man - Wadang. No matter what level of roof it is, whether it is a hard mountain, a hanging mountain, or the top of the temple or the top of the rest mountain, this guy standing in the front row is indispensable.
When people mastered the pottery technology, the tile was gradually invented, and the tile as an important component to protect the eaves of the roof, began to develop from the Western Zhou Dynasty, until the Qin and Han dynasties gradually matured, and reached the peak of the Western Han Dynasty.
Why is the tile round? Because the tile is based on the shape of the tile. The shape of the tile is generally divided into two types: semi-circular cylinder tiles and less semicircular slab tiles. When the roof is covered with tiles, a piece of slab tile is facing upwards and a piece of cylinder tile is downward, covering the gap between the slabs and tiles, so that they are buckled with each other to form an airtight roof tile roof. In order to protect the tile head, round tiles and water chestnut-shaped drips are placed in the front row of the roof.
Carved beams and paintings, ingenious craftsmanship is the characteristics of ancient Chinese architecture, almost every place in the building will be carved finely, tile and dripping water is no exception, it is simply a small sculpture museum. Especially in the Qin and Han dynasties, the theme of the tile pattern has been quite rich. There are all kinds of animal patterns, bird patterns, and plant patterns. Wadang was the most prosperous in the Western Han Dynasty, so large that it can be divided into two kinds: only the pattern is called "Huadang", and only the text is called "Zidang".
The most famous painting of the Western Han Dynasty is called "Four Gods Wadang". The "four gods" are the green dragon, the white tiger, the vermilion bird, and the Xuanwu, which are the sacred beasts in Chinese culture to ward off evil and avoid disasters, and also represent the four stars in the east, west, south and north of the sky. In ancient times, the green dragon, the white tiger, the vermilion bird, and the Xuanwu represented the four directions of front, back, left, and right. During the Warring States Period, there was a saying that the marching array was "the former Vermilion Bird, the rear Xuanwu, the left green dragon, and the right white tiger".
Among the unearthed Han Dynasty tiles, "Changle Weiyang" is a more common text tile. The words "Changle" and "Weiyang" convey people's good wishes for long-term joy and never end. In addition, there are various kinds of tiles such as "Long Live the Thousand Autumns" and "Only the Heaven Descends from the Spirit", which also reflects the cultural characteristics of ancient Chinese architecture.
Underneath the tile are rows of bucket arches. This is the most spiritual component of ancient Chinese architecture. To put it simply, a long bow of wood, with square blocks at both ends, forms the basic unit of a bucket. And the unit measure word of this lump of buckets on the building is called "Duo", floating under the eaves like a cloud, isn't it romantic?
The bucket arch uses the principle of mortise and tenon structure to overlap layer by layer, without nails, the firmness is comparable to reinforced concrete, and the flexibility is like a spring, which is enough to dissolve a considerable external force, so the bucket arch is the best "damping" device on the ancient building.
Dougong has different changes in different historical periods. Tang Dynasty buildings are majestic, often up to half the height of the columns, and the sturdy arms support the eaves that expand outward, so that the eaves can reach as much as four meters. The Song and Liao periods basically inherited the Tang system, and in the Ming and Qing dynasties, due to structural changes, the dougong has become a purely decorative small component.
Look down along the bucket arch, hey, there are two small wings on both sides of each pillar, what is this?
The name of this component is called "Queti", and it is a very important supporting structure on both sides of the column.
Although the finch for this component matured relatively late, its prototype can be traced back to the Northern Wei Dynasty. At first, it was just an inconspicuous "substitute wood" on the corner structure of the building, and then it slowly developed into a "finch substitute" with decorative functions.
Because the bucket is hidden under the eaves in most cases, it is not easy to distinguish, and the finch is generously exposed on both sides of the column, which solves the decorative problem of the column head part. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, which focused on decoration, the shape of the bird also developed more and more variants from the simple horizontal wood in the early days, so that the shape of the frame formed between the columns became softer and increased the spatial level of the building. In the end, the finch was developed into seven categories, namely: the big finch replacement, the Longmen finch substitution, the finch substitution, the small finch substitution, the tong finch substitution, the riding finch substitution and the flower tooth substitution. Coupled with the "hood" for interior decoration that evolved from Huayazi, this complex and huge family of birds has simply become the decorative half of the sky in ancient Chinese architecture.
Looking down from the finches, on both sides of the pillars, is the highlight of the decorative part of ancient Chinese architecture: the lattice fan. The lattice fan is a form of doors and windows installed between the columns, which appeared in the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty and reached its peak in the Ming and Qing dynasties.
If you look closely, the windows on this tower are called "mullioned windows", which are composed of a number of vertical wooden strips. In the early days, mullioned windows could not be opened, and the inside could be pasted with paper to prevent wind, which was also a form often used in Tang, Song, Liao, and Jin architecture.
In ancient times, windows were called "牖", and the earliest windows were produced in the cave-dwelling era when small holes were carved into the roof of caves. Later, after the evolution of residential buildings, it gradually became a window hole in the wall. The earliest existing wooden building, located in the Nanchan Temple of Wutai Mountain, uses a kind of window form of mullioned window, called "broken mullioned window", that is, a slats with a square cross-section are broken obliquely into two, and the section of each one forms a triangle, and the triangular section faces outward when installed, and the flat side faces inward, which is convenient for pasting paper in the window. In addition, there are other forms such as one horse and three arrow windows, mullioned windows, etc.
In all kinds of Qing court dramas, in "Returning the Pearl", in "Zhen Huan", we can see such a door, it is composed of two parts, the upper part is called the lattice, with paper or silk paste on the grid composed of wooden mullions, can transmit light;
The most decorative feature of the lattice door is the "lattice center" located in the center of the vision. In the various halls of the Ming and Qing Dynasty Imperial Palaces, the more gorgeous lattice fan form is used, which is called "three crosses and six ryoshi lattice hearts" or "double crosses and four ryoshi lattice hearts". This lattice consists of two or three latticeal crossings, each of which forms a six-petal rhombic flower, and a small metal nail is nailed to the intersection. In the decorative arts of ancient Chinese architecture, this is already the highest level of practice.
Chinese architectural art has reached its peak in the Qin and Han dynasties, and the so-called "Qin bricks and Han tiles" is to describe the glory of this period. The beautiful and elegant ancient buildings on the land of China are the crystallization of the wisdom of the ancient Chinese and the witness of thousands of years of Chinese civilization.
The breeze was blowing, the sun was gradually turning west, and the long shadows were slowly climbing up the tower, ready for the arrival of night.
Under the city tower, Zhang Zeduan cranked the folding fan and walked away slowly. The owl spine beast and the carved beam of the bucket arch on the city tower have been firmly remembered in his mind. He wanted to paint this majestic city tower, together with the high-rise buildings, merchants, and fishermen in Bianjing City, as well as the boats, boatmen, and fishermen on the Bianhe River, into a huge picture scroll that was five meters long and destined to last for centuries.
This is his mission and the city's luck.