zhouzhuang town

Zhouzhuang Town is a pre-selected world cultural heritage site and the first batch of national 5A-level tourist attractions. It is located in the southeast of Suzhou, at the junction of Kunshan, Wujiang and Shanghai.

Zhouzhuang Town is surrounded by water, with the river Cheng Zhen, and the street is the city. There are 14 ancient stone bridges built in the Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties in the well-shaped river channel. There are more than 811 aborigines living by the pillow river, and more than 61% of the houses still retain the architectural features of the Ming and Qing Dynasties.

Zhouzhuang has a long history, is a typical water town in the south of the Yangtze River, has a unique cultural landscape, and is a treasure of China water town culture and Wu local culture. There are also 14 ancient bridges with their own characteristics, such as Shen Wansan's former residence, Fuan Bridge and Shuangqiao.

Zhuang is located 33km southwest of Kunshan and 38km southeast of Suzhou. Zhouzhuang is about 91 kilometers away from Shanghai Hongqiao International Airport and more than 151 kilometers away from Shanghai Pudong International Airport and Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport.

As a small town in Zeguo, it is surrounded by water and has to travel by boat. Zhou Zhen, which is connected by Qiaojie, is a typical family with small bridges and flowing water in the south of the Yangtze River.

Most residents in Zhou Zhen live by the water. Wusong River and Loujiang River cross east and west. The larger lakes are Dianshan Lake, Yangcheng Lake, Hucheng Lake and Puppet Lake.

Baixian Lake Wharf

Zhouzhuang Town was formerly called Zhenfengli, and it was called "Shacheng" from the Spring and Autumn Period to the Han Dynasty. According to legend, Wu Wang was born young, and John Bojun was named here. Zhang, a writer in the Western Jin Dynasty, Liu Yuxi and Lu Guimeng, poets in the Tang Dynasty, all lived in Zhouzhuang. During the period of Yuan You in the Northern Song Dynasty (1186), Di Gong Lang believed in Buddhism and donated 211 mu (more than 13 hectares) of land to Quanfu Temple as temple property. People felt its kindness and named this land "Zhouzhuang". In 127, King XX moved here with Song Gaozong Du Nan, and the population gradually became dense.

the Zhuang Yuan dynasty belonged to Changzhou county, Suzhou prefecture. In the mid-Yuan Dynasty, Shen You, the legendary father of Shen Wansan, the richest man in the south of the Yangtze River, moved from Nanxun in Huzhou to Dongzhai Village east of Zhouzhuang (and moved to Yinzibang at the end of the Yuan Dynasty). He gradually became rich because of business, which made Zhenfeng prosperous and formed an old market town centered on Fuan Bridge on both sides of the North and South. In the Ming Dynasty, the town expanded westward, reaching Fuhong Bridge in Hougang Street and Puqing Bridge in Zhong Shi Street, and moved to Hougang Street. In the middle of Ming Dynasty, it belonged to Huating County, Songjiang Prefecture.

When the Qing Dynasty returned to Changzhou County, the residents became denser, and the Zhaxi area gradually became rows of shops, and the commercial center moved from Hougang Street to Zhong Shi Street. At this time, it has become an important town in the south of the Yangtze River, but it is still called Zhenfengli. It was not until the early years of Kangxi that it was officially renamed Zhouzhuang Town. In the third year of Yongzheng in Qing Dynasty (1725), Zhouzhuang Town was divided into Yuan and County, and about four fifths of it belonged to Yuan and County (now Wuxian County). One fifth belongs to Wujiang County (now Wujiang City). In the 26th year of Qianlong (1761), Chen Wengong, the governor of Jiangsu Province, moved the inspection department originally stationed in Jiaozhi Town of Wuxian County to Zhouzhuang, under the jurisdiction of Hucheng Lake, Huangtiandang Lake, Dushu Lake, Yinshan Lake and Baixian Lake, covering almost half the county. Zhou's rapid development from a small town to a commercial center has much to do with the prosperity of Shen Wansan, the richest man in the south of the Yangtze River. Taking advantage of Shen Wansan Baixian River (Dongjiang River) connecting Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal in the west and Liuhe River in the northeast, Zhouzhuang has been turned into a distribution center and trading center for grain, silk and various handicraft products, which has promoted the rapid development of Zhouzhuang handicraft industry and commerce. The most prominent products are silk, embroidery, bamboo products, foot stoves, alcohol and so on. After 1952, Zhouzhuang Town was under the jurisdiction of Kunshan County (now Kunshan City).

Chen Yifei oil painting-Shuangqiao

In the spring of p>1984, 38-year-old painter Chen Yifei came to Zhouzhuang by boat and saw Shuangqiao. He felt as if he were a boy again. So, with Shuangqiao as the background, I created an oil painting called Memories of My Hometown. Later, this painting, together with 37 of his works, was exhibited in Hammer Gallery named after armand hammer, the chairman of American Western Oil Company.

This painting caused a great sensation at that time. Later, it was bought and collected by armand hammer at a high price. In October of the same year, when Mr. Hammer visited China, he gave this painting to Deng Xiaoping. Through the propaganda of the news media, Zhouzhuang Town became famous. Chen Yifei's paintings brought the unknown double bridge to the world. The key is not the key, but the key, because it opens the door of friendship between Zhouzhuang and international exchanges.

before 1981s, because the town was far from the county seat, the economy was dominated by agriculture, and the industrial economy was relatively weak. In 1981, the total industrial output value of towns and villages was only over 5 million yuan. With the in-depth development of reform and opening up, coupled with the continuous improvement of traffic conditions such as the opening of Jishuigang Bridge, the economy of various industries has developed steadily, among which tourism has developed more rapidly. With the rapid rise of tourism in Zhouzhuang, we should actively adjust the agricultural structure, vigorously develop planting and aquaculture, and increase the supply of agricultural and sideline products to meet the needs of market changes.

A small bridge flows with water

At the end of Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of Ming Dynasty, Shen Wansan became the richest man in Jiangnan. He hired a famous chef to cook all kinds of delicacies, and was named "Three Thousand Family Banquets". Its banquet is fresh and delicate, with exquisite materials and excellent color, fragrance, taste and shape. The specialties are: 11,111 hoofs, Sanwei glutinous rice balls, steamed mandarin fish, steamed eel tube, water shield bass soup, ginger snail, stuffed meat oil bag, meat wrapped in louver, stewed tofu, cooked lotus root and so on. To taste the "Three Thousand Family Banquets", you can go to Shenting Restaurant. Located beside Fuan Bridge and Shen Guild Hall. It still retains the style of Ming and Qing dynasties, elegant and chic, and is a restaurant with local style.

There are four seasons of aquatic products in Zhuangzhen, among which the most famous is "Three Treasures of Xianhe": perch, white clam and whitebait. Zhou also produces eels, which is a well-known rural proverb. In addition, there are soft-shelled turtles and shrimps. Pickled amaranth and green balls, which are special products of the south of the Yangtze River, are also very popular with tourists. Cooked food includes sesame cake, peanut cake, walnut cake, salt and pepper cake, green cake and so on. There are also pickles and other tea dishes. There are traditional specialties such as wansanti, Sanweiyuan, cooked lotus root, water shield soup, white silk fish and white clam soup. Three hooves is a necessary dish for Shen Wansan, a wealthy family in the south of the Yangtze River, to entertain distinguished guests. "If there is a banquet at home, there must be a clear hoofbeat". After hundreds of years of circulation, it has become the main course of Zhouzhuang people's New Year holidays and wedding banquets, which means reunion and is also an excellent dish for entertaining guests.

Zhuangshenting

Water shield, a pampered aquatic crop, is temperate and suitable for growing in Hong Kong and Han with pure and calm water quality. Water shield has red stems and green stems. Generally, it is planted before and after Qingming, or before and after Bailu. Plants will be picked after two months of growth. Leaves floating on the water, oval, tender, with colloidal transparent substance on the back. Using tender leaves and stems of water shield to cook soup is delicious and nutritious. Hans Zhang, a writer in the Western Jin Dynasty, said that he was far away in Luoyang, and he still missed this delicious food in his hometown day and night, and he didn't even want to be an official. People store water shield in bottles or jars and can taste it all year round.

Three flavors, commonly known as soup gluten, take water gluten as the skin, and the stuffing is made of chicken breast, fresh shrimp, pork leg, onion, ginger, yellow wine and other seasonings. Cooked with chicken soup, the skin is thin and the stuffing is tender. Crystal clear, set snacks, dishes, fresh soup as a basin. In Jiangnan, Sanweiyuan is a very popular dish, and every family can cook it. Every year in June of the lunar calendar, when new wheat comes on stage, the sun-dried wheat should be ground and crushed and sieved with a fine sieve. Snow-white flour is stored separately. Only the bran is added with proper amount of salt and water and stirred into a paste. After an hour or two, rinse with clean water. The washed dough is sticky, that is, gluten, which can be made into three flavors of round skin and wrapped into various meat stuffing.

Qu Wanting

Sangao

Zou's ancestors started Gongmao Tea Workshop as early as the early Ming Dynasty. On holidays, Shen Wansan, its neighbor, ordered a large number of cakes to give away to friends and relatives, which were later called "Three Thousand Cakes". Zou's tea house not only produces traditional Wansan cake and Quanfugong cake, but also produces more than 21 kinds of cakes, such as sesame cake, peanut cake, walnut cake, jade belt cake, mint cake, salt and pepper cake, pine nut cake, fragrant baked cake, thousand-layer cake and step-by-step cake, according to the seasonal changes to meet the tastes of different customers.

Zhouzhuang Tourism Map

Over the past 911 years, the Zhuang people have developed many high-level traditional crafts. Zhouzhuang Bamboo Weaving and Zhuanglu are representative works. Zhou's teapot is also unique. In other places, teapots are mostly made of ceramics, while Zhou's teapots are made of stone. On the wall of the teapot, the relief is vivid and rich in image. As the representative of Jiangnan water town, Suzhou embroidery, pearls and other Jiangnan specialties can be seen everywhere here.

Zhouwenhua Street is very lively, which can be said to be the gathering place of traditional culture. On both sides of the street, culture is full of shops, including teahouses, pharmacies, blacksmiths, cotton mills, bamboo weaving factories, noodle kneading factories, carpenters and calligraphers ...

When you come to Zhouzhuang, you can also take special boats "No.3" and "Zhouzhuang" that integrate experience, leisure and sightseeing, and surround the upper reaches of the town water. It is one of the best choices for traveling in ancient water towns. It is 22.6 meters long and 5.5 meters wide, with luxurious decoration, air conditioning, teahouse, silk and bamboo, etc. The original ship No.3 is named after the treasure ship "Three Thousand" of Shen Wansan, the richest man in the south of the Yangtze River in the late Yuan Dynasty and early Ming Dynasty. Zhuang Hao carefully selected the original boat. On June 6, 2111, the informal meeting of APEC trade ministers was successfully held in the famous Zhouzhuang aquatic conference hall "Zhouzhuang Boat". Imitating the elegance of "Zhouzhuang Boat", a special cruise ship "Zhouzhuang" is set up for tourists to enjoy the beautiful scenery of the first water town in China along the waterway.

There are hundreds of cruise ships in Zhouzhuang, all of which are used by tourists in the water lanes. Walk along the river, and you will meet a cruise ship sailing in the river. Tourists relax on the sparkling water by boat, see the scenery of the ancient town, and listen to the singing of boatwoman Wu Ge. In the evening, board a cruise ship at the river pier opposite the Shenting, enjoy the sound of bamboo and silk in the south of the Yangtze River from the Fuan Bridge Building, and listen to the tinkling of Suzhou Pingtan from the windows of people along the river. The cruise ship meanders through many arch bridges in bridge opening, and countless colorful lights are embedded in the bridge opening, reflecting the reflection of thousands of ancient bridges on the river. "Lights, ancient bridges, ship shadows". This is the charm and charm of the night in the ancient town.

The scenic spots in Shenting

Week include: Temple, Shenting Hall, Shuangqiao, Fuan Bridge, Quanfu Temple, Mysterious Building and other scenic spots. Zhang Ting, formerly known as Yishuntang, was built in the Ming Dynasty. In the early Qing Dynasty, Zhang was moved to Yuyantang, commonly known as Zhang Ting. There are more than 71 rooms in front and back of the main hall, covering an area of more than 1,811 square meters. Beside the hall, the Jinghe River passes through the house. As the saying goes, "the bridge enters through the front door and the boat passes through the house." Zhang Ting, as the mansion of Yin Fujia, has experienced more than 511 years of vicissitudes, but its style remains the same. Calligraphy and painting are hung on the wall. The first couplet of the couplet is "the sedan chair goes forward from the door", and the second couplet is "the boat passes by its own door". This couplet aptly describes the architectural features of this hall. Shen Ting was built in 1742 by Shen Benren, a descendant of Shen Wansan, in the seventh year of Qing Dynasty. There are seven or five gatehouses and more than 111 houses, which are distributed on both sides of the 111-meter-long central axis and cover an area of more than 2,111 square meters. Shen Guild Hall consists of three parts. In front is the water wall door, which is the river port where family members dock ships and wash clothes; It is a middle-wall gatehouse, tea hall and main hall, which is used to pick up and drop off guests, handle weddings and funerals and discuss matters; Is the back lobby building, small hall building, back hall, where people live, where they live. The whole hall is a typical "front hall and back hall" architectural pattern. The front room and the back room are connected by the street building and the aisle pavilion. Form a huge building. The main hall is the Songmao Hall, covering an area of 1.71 square meters. The brick gatehouse in the main hall is the most magnificent of the five gatehouses, with a height of 6 meters. The plaque in the middle is "thick and flowing" and is surrounded by the relief of "red plum is spring". People, animals, pavilions, operas, stories, etc. Lifelike, it can be compared with the brick gatehouse of Suzhou Nets Lion Garden. There are large and small halls in the back, and the architectural style is quite different from that of the main hall. The restored Shen Temple is listed as a key cultural relic protection unit in Jiangsu Province.

Four Seasons Zhouzhuang is the perfection and refinement of Dream Zhouzhuang, the literary evening at the opening ceremony of the 12th China Zhouzhuang International Tourism Festival, and it is also the first live performance in China. Four Seasons Zhouzhuang takes water culture as the background, features local folk customs, and takes international fashion as the element, which shows Zhouzhuang's excellent traditional culture and rich folk customs. The repackaged Four Seasons Zhouzhuang will be performed for 61 minutes. It is divided into three chapters: Yunshui Zhouzhuang, Four Seasons Zhouzhuang and Folk Zhouzhuang. Using an open panoramic stage and combining various artistic means, the living conditions of people in Zhouzhuang water town, as well as the cultural characteristics and charming charm of Zhouzhuang are truly and vividly reproduced. There are about 211 performers, including professional actors, as well as a large number of local farmers, fishermen and citizens from the front line of life. The whole performance will be full of life and market flavor, which is an organic supplement and promotion of the ancient town's material culture. It will be performed on the water dance stage of Jiangnan people every day as a permanent tourism project.

Shen Ting

Zhou's clippers are very strange. Before the competition, skilled craftsmen put up a flower shed on the boat, which is called "Flower Fast". The flower shed is divided into shed, cabin shed and shed, and there are silk curtains on the shed. Gorgeous decoration, colorful. Hang colored lights and flags on the shed. Tassels are floating in the hut. In the cabin, sitting in a percussion band. The tall shed provides shade for the hands. The spare headbars, large paddles and small paddles of each ship are placed on the left and right sides of the hull. Next to the paddle, the springboard is placed on the outside, sticking out of the water. Each boat is equipped with 15 or 16 strong rowers. Wearing tight sweaters and embroidered sandals.

At the beginning of the competition, Zhou Zhoubi, Cun Cunbi and Dragon and Tiger paddlers performed their respective duties, jumping out, pulling up, holding the slot and cooperating tacitly. He stood proudly on the diving board, jerked it and stretched himself. Pull stamps at the first rebuke. Try to push and pull. The flagpole stands at the bow, points the flagpole, adjusts the direction and commands freely. In the sonorous sound of gongs and drums, the participating clippers seemed to fly out of the string and strive for the first place.

shaking scissors

Zhuang people have a long history of drinking tea. They have always had the customs of "grandma tea", "talking about tea", "happy tea", "spring tea" and "full moon tea", which are called "tea ceremony" in Jiangnan water towns.

Zhuang's "granny tea" is quite famous in Jiangnan water town. When we talked about Zhouzhuang, we didn't really go to Zhouzhuang until we had grandma's tea. In Zhouzhuang, anyone who has eaten grandma's tea will taste the taste of an ancient water town. In Zhouzhuang, whether in the town or in the countryside, you can often see men, women and children sitting around a seat, cups of green tea and plates of refreshments, talking and laughing while eating, which is called "granny tea".

Zhuang people have a long history of eating granny tea. Nowadays, people in deep houses still cherish the exquisite blue-and-white porcelain-covered tea bowls, exquisite teacups, elegant and quaint teapots and brightly glazed tea trays in the Song Dynasty. In the Yuan Dynasty, Chen Qubing's ancestors moved from Zhejiang to Zhouzhuang, where they hammered ovens and made copper and tin teapots for a living. Today, the town still retains the Huiban tea houses built in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, of which Greeny was opened in the early Qing Dynasty and Chengyitai was opened in the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. Hui Tea House buys primary tea from the place of origin. In order to meet the needs of tea drinkers, it screens, re-dries, adds fragrance to flowers, and sells them in color, with good color and fragrance.

Apocha

The girl's dress is elegant and exquisite: a red scarf is tied on her head, and both sides of the back are folded. Two black braids with Red Velvet ropes on both sides were exposed. They are dressed in big chests and short jackets with small flower heads, decorated with flowered cloth and small pipa buttons, and tied with small pleated aprons of Shilin blue cloth around their waists. The waist pocket board (commonly known as waist board) is embroidered with various exquisite patterns, and the blue color head is also decorated with red and green tassels. Under the skirt, I wore a pair of blue trousers and embroidered piping shoes on my feet. The whole dress presents a beauty.

Middle-aged women are dressed in a large-breasted coat made of pulp stone forest blue cloth, a shallow lake-colored piping lute buckle, a blue pleated apron at the waist, a small apron of the same color (commonly known as the official skirt) and plain cloth shoes on their feet. Their headdresses are also different from those of girls. Towels used in Baotou are plain, some are wrapped in blue cloth, and a colored rope bun (commonly known as hair handle) is combed on the head. In a bun