Global Times: Ring-shaped earthen dwellings in East China, harbor for Hakka people’s body and soul
Hakka Fujian Tulou villages blend ancient architecture, nature-based wisdom, and living heritage, thriving through culture and tourism.
Beijing, China, Dec. 08, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- China's traditional villages have become the largest group of protected agricultural civilization heritage sites in the world. Rural civilization is the mainstay of the history of Chinese civilization, and villages are carriers of that civilization. These ancient villages, based on diverse styles of dwellings and scattered throughout the country, have developed their own unique character under the nurturing influence of local environments and culture. The wisdom of the harmonious coexistence between humanity and nature, passed down for centuries, has in turn supported the lives of those who call these lands home, ultimately becoming a spiritual haven for villagers. In this series, the Global Times explores five types of unique and representative traditional villages around China to discover the secrets of their unceasing vitality. This is the fourth installment.
Lin Rigeng, or Uncle A Geng as he is fondly called by many, was born and raised in Hongkeng village in Longyan, East China's Fujian Province. The 75-year-old man recently developed vocal cord polyps from talking too much with tourists and has just undergone surgery. Despite this, he still tirelessly greets the flood of visitors to the village as a local guide whose Hakka tales are undimmed by his husky voice.
Including Uncle A Geng and his neighbors, nearly all residents of Hongkeng village share the sur-name "Lin." The surname is the most common in the province, revealing they were descendants of an-cient Hakka migrants from China's Central Plains, particularly from Xinxiang, Henan Province.
The 700-year-old Hongkeng village is a tourist magnet. Seen from afar, it looks unremarkable, like a sunken pit cradled in green hills. Yet this very rural "pit" holds a treasure of world heritage, the Fujian Tulou.
Hakka pragmatism
With its earth-toned and ring-shaped appearance, the Tulou is a type of rammed-earth communal dwelling that the Hakka people often describe with the poetic phrase "From earth it grows, by circle it unites." They are both home and a village unto themselves, with some Fujian Tulou traditionally housing up to 800 people.
The Tulou complex in Hongkeng village is more commonly known as the Tulou cluster of Yongding (Lit: perpetual stability). It bears the generational yearning of the Hakka people: to settle and have a place to call home forever.
The Hakka people's longing for a stable home is deeply rooted in their history. In ancient times, after migrating from the Central Plains to southern to escape frequent wars, they built these enclosed Tulou buildings as fortified structures to defend against invaders. During their migration, the Hakka people didn't just land in Fujian, but other southern regions like Guangdong Province, which also has a scattering of their traditional residences.
But among them, the Tulou in Fujian is the most iconic. In 2008, 46 of these dwellings in the province were recognized by UNESCO as World Heritage Sites.
Within Hongkeng village, there are several World Heritage buildings, including Uncle A Geng's own home, which is the "Zhencheng building," a double-ring Tulou. Nearby Uncle A Geng's place, there is a square mansion-style building known as a Fuyu. Another smaller one is called a Kuiju building, which features a rectangular palace-like architectural style.
The reason why not all Tulou buildings are circular is because Hakka people "won't sacrifice usefulness for the sake of aesthetics," You Bidan, a Hakka resident who is also a Tulou expert, told the Global Times. Although the round shape is the most ideal, homes were designed according to the features of the land to maximize usable space. "It actually shows the Hakka people's pragmatism in construction," You added.
Situating at the central spot at the village which has more than 120 Tulou buildings, the building where Uncle A Geng's family lives attracts the most visitors since it balances practicality while also showing impressive aesthetics.
Covering around 5,000 square meters, the Tulou building, which now only houses 15 households with 80 people, was constructed using entirely natural materials sourced from within the village. Its main body is a gigantic circular structure built from sandy-yellow rammed earth.
The material looks very refined, and often bears surface cracks like a tortoise's shell. Yet, it is exceptionally tough. Over a century ago, before building quality could be measured scientifically, Lin's ancestors built the rammed earth walls by gut feeling - it should hold together when held in the hand, yet crumble when dropped.
Blessed by such an ingenuity, the 113-year-old Tulou still stands. Wrapped by the thick mud material, its skeleton is made up of numerous bamboo and fir pillars. After this skeleton was covered in mud, the Tulou's wall measures 1.6 meters thick, solid enough to keep any intruder outside.
Generally speaking, the Hakka community avoids flaunting wealth. This is why the Zhencheng build-ing looks modest from the outside, but fine on the inside. This four-story house rises 16 meters above the ground without using a single nail. It solely relies on an intricate wooden framework of pillars connected solely by sunmao, or mortise-and-tenon joints, a traditional Chinese method of connecting wood.
Accommodating hundreds of residents in one dwelling is not an easy thing. However, the Hakka people managed it by using a "vertical living" wisdom to separate functional spaces while keeping a neighborly feel of "united but with privacy," said You.
Taking Uncle A Geng's household as an example, all its rooms are arranged vertically across four floors rather than side by side. The first-floor kitchen and dining area sit next to those of his neighbors, making it easy for people to share meals or gather together for some local oolong tea. The second floor is for storage, while the third and fourth floors serve as the living rooms and bedrooms.
"Although there are no toilets inside the Tulou, and climbing stairs can be challenging as we age, this has become our way of life and we don't want to change," Lin told the Global Times.
Borrowing nature's wisdom
The Tulou's unique architectural design is also deeply rooted in local people's farming culture.
Since ancient times, these building's second floor - where the storage room is located - were all built without open windows as they are used to protect harvested crops, such as tobacco and tea leaves.
Opening his storage room with a rusted old-fashioned key, Lin told the Global Times that in the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), his ancestors built the Tulou with earnings from tobacco farming. "It was not just a history of our family business, but a mirror reflecting how the Hakka people earn a living with our own hands," Lin said.
He also added that with the changing market demand in modern life, fruit and tea are gradually replacing tobacco.
Walking around for about 10 minutes, people may notice that the trees on the hills that enclose Hongkeng village are orange-red, a color derived from the fully mature persimmons known as "Early Red."
As the Tulou's building ingenuity allows light to come in from all four sides, villagers place freshly picked persimmons on bamboo-woven trays and sun-dry them on the building's expansive rooftops. This event, aptly named shai qiu (lit: autumn sun-drying), holds the hopes of the Hakka people for a good harvest.
Not only persimmons, but also oranges with a jelly-like texture, passion fruit, and herbs for Hakka tea, all thrive around the Tulou buildings. This shows the Hakka rural wisdom of living in ecological harmony with nature.
This wisdom is not unique to Hongkeng village alone.
A 40-minute drive takes you to the village of Chuxi, where the Tulou clusters stand out as they form a complete ecological chain with the nearby mountains, fields, and streams.
Atop the mountain, far from the Tulou buildings, lies the source of a stream. It flows down through the farmland that is right behind people's houses. The wise Hakka people diverted it here. One branch of the stream irrigates the crops, another supplies the residences, nurturing locals' water-based livelihoods such as paper-making and rice wine brewing.
"We, the Hakka people, arrived here with nothing. But in building with earth or drawing life from water, we knew one thing: to borrow wisdom from nature," Liao Yulian, a local villager, told the Global Times.
Shared beliefs
Dark as vinegar and sweet as honey, Liao brews her Hakka rice wine for a living at her Chuxi Tulou building. Be it a familiar neighbor or curious traveler, she will always offer a cup to them for free. The cup carries a Hakka cultural belief: Be hospitable as hosts, mindful as guests.
In the Chinese language, "Hakka people" is Kejia ren, which literally translates as "people of guests." Once settled, this humbleness guided them to establish their spiritual faith, a faith that is still visible on the couplets that hang above a Tulou's courtyard.
Yanfa xingze, fuguo shangen (lit: Speech orderly, behavior proper; blessings result from virtuous roots) is a hallmark one. It conveys the Hakka ancestral code, teaching descendants to always match words with deeds and cultivate fortune through virtuous action.
At a schoolhouse built within a Fuyu Tulou, another couplet carries a message for future generations. It says "Enlighten the young to study diligently from an early age, and to love both country and homeland as they grow." Such a creed reveals how the Hakka faith evolves as time progresses and modernity unfolds.
"For us, making a home here is about passing on our faith. And it is this faith that guides Hakka people scattered across seas and lands toward their 'home,'" Uncle A Geng told the Global Times.
Over the years, Uncle A Geng has witnessed a growing number of visitors to his village. Some come from Europe, speaking German or French, while many others, like Lin Wanrou and Lin Huimei, arrive from Malaysia and the island of Taiwan. Their shared surname, Lin, acts like a name card, revealing that despite distances, Hakka culture still has the same roots.
On a trip across Fujian Province, Lin Huimei, the Taiwan visitor, told the Global Times that she "could skip anywhere else but had to see the Tulou." This is because at that place, she could "trace the memories of her ancestors" and bring photos back to the Taiwan island to better tell her children about their cultural roots.
Not long before Lin Huimei's trip, Lai Yueh-chien, also known as Lai Yueqian, a political commentator from Taiwan island, also made a visit to Longyan with his wife to seek his own roots. They made a special stop at Uncle A Geng's Zhencheng building. The local expert You happened to serve as their guide.
"I still remember he said he felt a sense of familiarity with the Hakka dialect, remarking that he could feel the unity of the Hakka people living within the Tulou building," You told the Global Times.
A focal point
With the increasing number of tourists, more and more local villagers like Liao are beginning to explore ways to take part in rural cultural tourism and improve their lives through it.
In addition to selling local agricultural products, Hongkeng village has enhanced the interactive visiting experience by integrating digital technologies. Through VR and AR reconstruction, visitors can witness how ancient Hakka people built these structures.
Noticing "rural tourism + sports" has become a new trend, the village now regularly organizes events such as "Tulou marathons." Such events transform the immovable buildings into carriers of dynamic community life. Also, local villagers' products and intangible cultural elements such as persimmons and Hakka pattern designs have been developed into cultural and creative products.
The village's tourism development started in the mid-1990s and has evolved with the times. Take Uncle A Geng as an example. In 1996, he started giving tours, relying primarily on oral storytelling and printed materials. Following the UNESCO World Heritage title in 2008, the local area shifted its focus to improving basic tourism infrastructure.
"Now, we have progressed to integrating 'experiential and emotional tourism.' Also, we use the Tulou as a focal point to develop regional tourism," local cultural tourism expert Lai Guirong told the Global Times.
"No matter how much cultural tourism innovates, the heritage value of the Tulou must not be compromised for economic gain," noted Lai.
Source: Global Times:
Company: Global Times
Contact Person: Anna Li
Email: editor@globaltimes.com.cn
Website: https://globaltimes.cn
City: Beijing
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