Mou's Manor Travel Guide

Mou’s manor has a certain amount of history, and it is indeed not easy to preserve it. You can feel the story background of the entire scenic spot and the stories that happened here. The overall landscape is unique, high-end and classy, ??which indeed attracts many tourists to visit.

The Mou Family Manor in Qixia City, near Yantai, Shandong Province, was built in the 13th year of Yongzheng (1735). After years of continuous construction, it reached its current scale in the 20th year of the Republic of China (1935). It is estimated that the entire building complex cost about 442,000 taels of silver, and it is now a national key cultural protection unit.

The manor now covers an area of ??about 200,000 square meters, with more than 480 rooms, divided into three groups and six courtyards. This is the largest and most complete feudal landowner's manor in China. The picture above shows the main entrance of the manor. As an important cultural tourist attraction, the number of tourists visited by the author during non-epidemic periods seems to be too few.

As the largest existing landowner's estate in China, Mou's Manor occupied more than 60,000 acres of farmland, mountains and forests in its heyday More than 200,000 acres, 153 villages, and annual grain rent of 6.5 million jin! In addition, there are workshops and industries such as grain, oil, and medicine. The reason why it remains relatively intact today is because the manor was occupied by the county government during the land reform in 1947 and was not divided between tenant farmers and poor peasants. This architectural complex and its original style were able to preserve Chalon, but the grain, oil and medicinal plant areas belonging to the original manor were destroyed and demolished and are now under construction.

China is a large country with thousands of years of farming tradition, and rural areas have always been an important theme in Chinese novels and movies. How to express the violent turmoil and changes in rural society in the past century has been the focus of literary and artistic creation in recent years.

Some time ago, when the TV series adapted from the novel "White Deer Plain" was released, the comments were very lively. Previously, Wang Quanan's version of the movie of the same name was once very lively (Note: Zhang Yuqi starred in "Xiao Bai's E"). However, this complex intertwined story of several generations on the Weihe Plain and the 800-mile Qinchuan River has almost become the love history of Xiao Bai'e alone in the movie. Not many people are satisfied with this adaptation, and there are also many critics. Compared with Zhang Yimou's film "Alive", this film adapted from Yu Hua's novel won international awards and was recognized by everyone. The gap between the two is huge.

Of course, the protagonist of "Alive" (note: played by Ge You in the movie; see picture above) is a small landowner with only more than 200 acres of land. The story line and character relationships are relatively simple, and the movie plot is easier to control. But in China, generally speaking, rural-themed sad dramas do not do well at the box office. For example, Feng Xiaogang's movie "1942" describes the Henan disaster, involving tens of millions of victims and the tragic deaths of millions of people! For such a blockbuster movie, its box office performance seems a bit tragic, and it is difficult to return to the original work. Therefore, why Wang Quanan almost made "White Deer Plain" into a love story of Xiao Bai'e? It is difficult to see her "strategy" at the box office.

As a traditional agricultural country, China has suffered from frequent disasters and serious harm in history. It is called a "famine country" by Western scholars. As a result, there are many scholars in China who specialize in the history of natural disasters, because this is an exploratory window for studying the laws of social and political changes in past dynasties. Anyone who has read some history books knows that going back 4,000 years ago, natural disasters occurred one after another in China, and history books are filled with tragic disaster records! Floods, droughts and locust plagues, these three major disasters, are often described as "the countryside is desolate, with ten houses and nine empty houses". The tragic scenes are horrifying!

The reason why Mou's manor became rich in the past was precisely because of the power of disaster. The most important time node for the prosperity of the Mou family was the 16th to 17th years of Daoguang. At that time, there was a severe drought in Shandong. Under the control of Mou Molin, the Mou family quickly expanded their land area by exchanging grain for land... The Mou family exploded rapidly within a few years. , but it is a history of blood and tears for the farm

It took Mou’s family nine generations and about 200 years to acquire such an industry. But its management model is very traditional: except for a small amount of self-cultivated land (land cultivated by long-term workers themselves), a large amount of land is released for cultivation by tenant farmers. Previously, Mou distributed land to tenants, and the land was divided into three classes. Among them, about 20 acres of medium-sized land are leased to each farmer, and each farmer pays 27 kilograms (about one bucket) of grain per mu every year. Therefore, as long as 60 barrels of grain are handed over, farmers can use the remaining grain to maintain their lives. But later the rent gradually increased, and finally increased to three measures of grain per mu. In addition, when collecting accounts, farmers have to endure deductions from their owners on measuring tools, moisture measurement, etc., making farmers' livelihood increasingly difficult.

In addition, the tenants have to work for the landlord for free for about two months.

Some people today may think that one or three tons of grain per acre is not an exaggeration. But you must know that in the past, without the support of advanced technologies such as chemical fertilizers and improved seeds, the yield per mu was far less than it is today. And anyone who has been to the Qixia area of ??Yantai can feel that the soil fertility in the hilly area where they are located is not fertile, and it may not be easy to cultivate land for food production.

Here we will discuss Mou’s daily business model described in the existing materials, which mainly involves hiring accounting teachers and accounting teachers to maintain daily operations: each small estate has 4-5 accounting teachers. In addition to free room and board, these accounting teachers can also receive 500 coins per year, which is about 100 silver coins. This is equivalent to the annual income of 6-7 long-term workers in Mou's Manor (note: each long-term worker earns about 13-15 silver dollars a year in addition to food and accommodation). In this way, a layer-by-layer jurisdictional relationship is formed between tenants, permanent employees, accounting teachers, and accounting teachers to carry out business activities.

Of course, the story about Mou Wealth is far from what the author can tell clearly in a few hundred words here. Only a rough outline can be drawn here. If you are interested, you may wish to explore it yourself.

This is a courtyard in the manor.

Such exquisite courtyards are distributed in the manor, overlooking the appearance of the manor.

The picture shows that this is a model of the manor. Nearly half of the buildings on the right side were the former grain, oil and medicinal materials workshops of the manor. But this part has been destroyed and is now under construction.

The picture shows the antique buildings under construction around the manor. It is said that there will be restaurants, hotels, leisure shopping and other facilities.

The picture shows this is a measuring tool for rent collection: a bucket. As a unit of capacity (note: not a weighing tool), 10 liters is one bucket, and 10 buckets is one stone.

The picture shows that when the manor was built, the bricklaying was very particular, and the gaps in the walls made of natural stone were closely connected. Such meticulous work is required in all buildings on the estate. Although most of the buildings in the manor are one or two hundred years old, they still look quite solid.

It shows that during the Anti-Japanese War, the manor served as the residence of the Second Teaching Regiment of the Jiaodong Military Region, the Anti-Japanese University Branch and other Chinese Communist military organizations. The political slogans of that year are still left on the beams of this building. The reason why it is written on the beam is because there is a partition in the middle of the building and it is a two-story house.

It is a newly built luxury attraction near the manor: Taixu Palace, which seems to be expensive. There are also very few tourists here.

This Taixu Palace is said to be the former residence of Qiu Chuji, the founder of the Quanzhen Dragon School of Taoism in China and a famous moralist, hygienist and writer. In the history and beliefs of Taoism, Qiu Chuji is considered one of the "Seven Truths" of Quanzhen Taoism and the founder of Longmen Sect.

Anyone who is familiar with Jin Yong's martial arts novels "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" and "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" knows that Qiu Chuji is a national hero who is described as a heroic Taoist priest with great martial arts skills who resisted gold and protected the people. He is Jin Yong's favorite character.