Shanxi repairing Yuan Dynasty living sites

The village of Shangzhuang, in Shanxi province, has been doing repair work on three seriously damaged sets of housing dating back to the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) for more than two months now, spending 2 million yuan ($328,600) on a project sponsored by the Cultural Relics Department. The work is being overseen by the Beijing Tongxing Historic Building Construction Co and is expected to be finished in two weeks.

Shangzhuang is the home of Wang Guoguang, an outstanding statesman, reformer, and head of the Ministry of Personnel during the Ming Dynasty (1368－1644) and a village with an interesting history and culture. Three of these houses are part of a farmhouse, and were uncovered during a National Relics Survey, in 2011, and identified as Yuan dwellings by experts. Shanxi has four such folk dwellings from the Yuan.

He Dalong, researcher of the Shanxi Historic Architectural Protection Institute, said the Shangzhuang dwellings are older than the Jishi dwellings, based on the architectural style and structure, popular in the late Jin Dynasty (1115－1234). Those in Jishi use a style popular during the Ming. The original occupants moved out to further protect the valuable sites and the local relics department is applying for province-level protection after having failed to get State-level protection.

Edited by Roger Bradshaw