302
THE DANGS OF KAM TIN
AND
THEIR JIU FESTIVAL*
CHAN WING-HOI
Of the lineages of the New Territories, that of the Dangs of Kam Tin is noted for its vast land holdings, numerous imperial degrees and control of the Kam Tin Market. While the Dangs and outsiders talk about them as a corporate entity, and the Dangs do trace their descent from a common ancestor, it was the different segments of the lineage whose collective presence in ancestral trusts and halls is most noticeable. Contrary to what one would expect, there is no ancestral hall or any significant ancestral trust in honour of the common ancestor Dang Hung-Yi. The main ancestral halls and ancestral trusts highlight the divisions within the lineage rather than its unity.
Unlike some other single-surname settlements in Hong Kong, the various Dang villages in Kam Tin do not correspond to segments of the lineage. Each of the villages has its own village temples or other places of worship which delimit the villages as collective entities. Religious activities associated with these local places of worship are part of the duties arising from membership of the village, and are different in nature from worship at popular temples at the nearby market, the latter being more a matter of personal choice than a function of membership in a corporate group.
The eventful period of the early Qing Dynasty was a major turning point in Dang history. This period saw the merger of a number of Dang settlements. It was during the same period that the Jau and Wong Temple was built and the jiu festival in honour of the same deities was first celebrated.
* This report represents the result of field and library research I conducted as a temporary researcher of the Hong Kong Museum of History within the four months ending 15th March 1986, centring on the 1985 Jiu festival.
I would like to express my gratitude to the Hong Kong Museum of History, Urban Council, for permission to publish this report which is based on part of the report I submitted.
For the romanization of Cantonese this report has adopted the Yale system. For local place names I have followed common usage. For a few terms more directly related to the wider "China" than the "local" area I have used the Mandarin pronunciation and the pinyin system. See glossary at the Appendix for Chinese characters of all words romanised.
302
THE DANGS OF KAM TIN
AND
THEIR JIU FESTIVAL*
CHAN WING-HOI
Of the lineages of the New Territories, that of the Dangs of Kam Tin is noted for its vast land holdings, numerous imperial degrees and control of the Kam Tin Market. While the Dangs and outsiders talk about them as a corporate entity, and the Dangs do trace their descent from a common ancestor, it was the different segments of the lineage whose collective presence in ancestral trusts and halls is most noticeable. Contrary to what one would expect, there is no ancestral hall or any significant ancestral trust in honour of the common ancestor Dang Hung-Yi. The main ancestral halls and ancestral trusts highlight the divisions within the lineage rather than its unity.
Unlike some other single-surname settlements in Hong Kong, the various Dang villages in Kam Tin do not correspond to segments of the lineage. Each of the villages has its own village temples or other places of worship which delimit the villages as collective entities. Religious activities associated with these local places of worship are part of the duties arising from membership of the village, and are different in nature from worship at popular temples at the nearby market, the latter being more a matter of personal choice than a function of membership in a corporate group.
The eventful period of the early Qing Dynasty was a major turning point in Dang history. This period saw the merger of a number of Dang settlements. It was during the same period that the Jau and Wong Temple was built and the jiu festival in honour of the same deities was first celebrated.
* This report represents the result of field and library research I conducted as a temporary researcher of the Hong Kong Museum of History within the four months ending 15th March 1986, centring on the 1985 Jiu festival.
I would like to express my gratitude to the Hong Kong Museum of History, Urban Council, for permission to publish this report which is based on part of the report I submitted.
For the romanization of Cantonese this report has adopted the Yale system For local place names I have followed common usage. For a few terms more directly related to the wider "China" than the "local" area I have used the Mandarin pronunciation and the pinyin system. See glossary at the Appendix for Chinese characters of all words romanised.
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