The traditional meaning of the gatehouse of ancient buildings

    The ancient gate building, representing the identity of the head of the household, is a symbol of the rich and the poor. It is one of the manifestations of the hierarchical concept of Chinese feudal society and the symbol of family culture. "Class" also lies in this. We can make a preliminary judgment on the owner through the gate of the ancient building, what grade of official, or received what rewards and so on.

    How to judge the general situation of the owner of Shimen Building? Chinese people like to use metaphor to express, through the interpretation of the carving patterns, characters and shapes of Shimen Building, we may know something about it.

    Gatehouse of ancient architecture also contains profound cultural connotation. Every gate tower of ancient architecture contains rich connotation and symbolic meaning, and these connotations and symbols are mainly through the various patterns and patterns carved and painted on the stone gate upstairs, which are expressed by metaphorical means.

    For example, these patterns are often found on memorial archways; Dragon and Phoenix: If you see an archway with dragons and phoenixes engraved on it, it must have a close connection with the royal family. Because the dragon is the honor of all animals, is the symbol of the supreme emperor in the feudal society; Phoenix is the head of a hundred birds, the feudal society often used as a symbol of noble queen.

    Bat: The Chinese character "bat" sounds similar to the Chinese character "fu", so it is a symbol of good luck and happiness. People often use five bats to symbolize the five blessings of longevity, health, wealth, safety, prosperity and offspring.
Deer: Homophonic with the Chinese character for "lu", it is often used in the carving patterns of Shimen Buildings. To symbolize promotion and gold list title.

    Animals, flowers and implements with symbolic significance, such as pine, crane, turtle, kylin, lotus, lotus leaf, peony and ruyi, are also often carved and painted on the upper floor of the Stone gate, expressing the rich connotations of longevity, happiness anf health.

    In addition to these animal and plant patterns, shimenlou's biggest feature is the forehead plaque. For example, on the stone Gate building imported from Zhongshan Park in Beijing, there are four characters "Safeguarding peace" inscribed by Guo Moruo, in order to show the object and reason of construction of this stone gate building, otherwise it will lose the significance and value of construction.
In addition, there will be a clear indication in the stone gate upstairs stone gate building is built for who, why it was built, built by who and when it was built and other content, some will write couplets.These characters are the concentrated expression of people's life concept, feudal ethical code and traditional moral concept in Chinese feudal society.