313
Documents confirm that Sing-Ngok's descendants had a large portion of the more than 160 acres of Kam Tin Dang land-holdings on Hong Kong island.
D. Sung-Kok jou and the Gwong-Yu Tong and Lei-Ging Tong
I have mentioned before that the second ancestor of the fourth branch, Naam-Kai, had been adopted from the first branch. This connection might be expected to serve to make the two branches feel closer together. However, fung-sheui stories hint at feelings of rivalry between the first and the fourth branches, especially after the rise of the latter during or after Dang Man-Wai's time in the later seventeenth century. However, it was only a few segments of the fourth branch which prospered: a letter from the leaders of the Kam Tin Dangs in 1941 claimed that the ancestral fund for Naam-Kai used to be a broken house in the county town of Xin'an until it was expanded to a farmland holding of over 200 sek in rent value under the management of the youngest son of Dang Kyun-Hin (1755-1822). It was only the families of Dang Man-Wai and of his brothers who enjoyed great prosperity from early in the Qing dynasty.
The present descendants of Dang Man-Wai attribute the prosperity of their segment (known as Gwong-Yu Tong) to the jeun-si degree of Man-Wai, which he won in 1685. But from 1657, i.e. almost 20 years earlier, he was already a geui-yan, one of only two or three ever achieved from the Hong Kong region, which should have placed him in a very advantageous position especially in this period. According to a stone inscription, Man-Wai started the Yuen Long Market in 1669, and until it was replaced by the New Market in 1898 this market was run by the ancestral trust of Man-Wai, the Gwong-Yu Tong. Man-Wai was also credited with having compiled a genealogy and having initiated the building of an ancestral hall for the larger Dang clan. His sons and grandsons included many imperial degree/title holders involved in lineage matters.
The spirit tablets of two of Dang Man-wai's brothers are housed in the Lei-Ging Tong, an ancestral hall which used to be in the present playground, but which was later moved to near the Sun Ngai Brass factory on Kam Sheung Road. The original building was only a little smaller than the Gwong-Yu Tong. One of the two brothers was Dang Ng-sang, who, according to Sung (1974:185), built the ancestral hall. Some village elders confirmed that he was the same Ng-sang who was the leader of
313
Documents confirm that Sing-Ngok's descendants had a large portion of the more than 160 acres of Kam Tin Dang land-holdings on Hong Kong island."
D. Sung-Kok jou and the Gwong-Yu Tong and Lei-Ging Tong
I have mentioned before that the second ancestor of the fourth branch, Naam-Kai, had been adopted from the first branch. This connection might be expected to serve to make the two branches feel closer together. However, fung-sheui stories hint at feelings of rivalry between the first and the fourth branches, especially after the rise of the latter during or after Dang Man-Wai's time in the later seventeenth century. However, it was only a few segments of the fourth branch which prospered: a letter from the leaders of the Kam Tin Dangs in 1941 claimed that the ancestral fund for Naam-Kai used to be a broken house in the county town of Xin'an until it was expanded to a farmland holding of over 200 sek in rent value under the management of the youngest son of Dang Kyun- Hin (1755-1822). It was only the families of Dang Man-Wai and of his brothers who enjoyed great prosperity from early in the Qing dynasty.
The present descendants of Dang Man-Wai attribute the prosperity of their segment (known as Gwong-Yu Tong) to the jeun-si degree of Man-Wai, which he won in 1685. But from 1657, i.e. almost 20 years earlier, he was already a geui-yan, one of only two or three ever achieved from the Hong Kong region, which should have placed him in a very advantageous position especially in this period. According to a stone inscription, Man-Wai started the Yuen Long Market in 1669, and until it was replaced by the New Market in 1898 this market was run by the ancestral trust of Man-Wai, the Gwong-Yu Tong. Man-Wai was also credited with having compiled a genealogy and having initiated the building of an ancestral hall for the larger Dang clan." His sons and grandsons included many imperial degree/title holders involved in lineage
matters.
The spirit tablets of two of Dang Man-wai's brothers are housed in the Lei-Ging Tong, an ancestral hall which used to be in the present playground, but which was later moved to near the Sun Ngai Brass factory on Kam Sheung Road. The original building was only a little smaller than the Gwong-Yu Tong. One of the two brothers was Dang Ng-sang, who, according to Sung (1974:185), built the ancestral hall. Some village elders confirmed that he was the same Ng-sang who was the leader of
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