Danba
2000-Year-Old
Villages
5 Dec. 2005
Danba is a Tibet
Autonomous Region in Sichuan province in
Western China, with a population of
58,000 people.
The altitude in
this region varies between 4,000 m to
5,820 m above sea level, which brings
rapid landscape change in the low to high
altitude sequences between lush grassland
to snow-capped mountains.
Danba has been
known as Kingdom of a Thousand Castles,
among which the tallest tower measures 60
meters in height.
It is also the
home for an important archaeological site
containing stone coffins in Neolithic
tombs.
The majority of
the castles in Danba are timberstone
structures, while the earliest surviving
tower, dating 2,000 years back, was built
of rubble fieldstone alone.
The structural
shapes of the castles include square,
pentagon, hexagon, octagon, twelve-sides
and thirteen-sides.
These
Tibetan style buildings typically have 3
to 5
floors, with the external walls richly
decorated with religious symbols or
images, such as the sun, the moon and
stars. Accompanied by colourful sutra
flags fluttering in wind before the gates
and over the roofs, the castles of
ancient times truly induce mystical
feelings in visitors approaching the
villages.
Ever since ancient
times, during harvest seasons, villages
would run beauty contests.
The girls here
have long been praised for their beauty
and charm, which earns Danba the nickname
"Beauty Valley."
As the legend
goes, the long ago after the collapse of
a dynasty, a large number of imperial
ladies fled the palace and took refuge in
this seclude community.
China
stories are told at wenhousecrafts.com
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