Study On The History, Mountain Fortresses For Civilian Residence In Sichuan Basin

Civilian fortresses are architectural complex with a purpose of defendence civilian life is their fundamental use .they play an important part in the traditional archtecture and can be seen frequently in China.among them,Tu lou in Fujian and Wei zi in the south of Jiangxi are the famous ones.In the southest of Sichuan, there exist a lot of civilian fortresses with Sichuan characteristics, due to such particular social environment as warfare, bully, migration and mountainous terrain.In history,Civilian fortresses could be traced back to military fortresses.Moutain fortresses for civilian residence in the southeast of Sichuan were developed from two architectural cultures. One is the escablphrent of local military fortresses in Sichuan since Song dynasty;the other is that of the civilain residence of the immigrants since Ming and Qing Dynasties.these two factors together led to the maturity of Civilian fortresses.In these special environments,a new architectual culture graudually came into being with its own characteristics:divercity assimilation and localization.There are many kinds of civilian fortresses in the Southeast of Sichuan.according to different constructors and users,they can be classified into Clan civilian fortresses,territorial civilian fortresses,industrial civilian fortresses and complex civilian fortresses,among which Clan civilian fortresses are the most tipical ones.For the planning,the civilian fortresses are usually built on strategic places.The focuses might vary according to different circumstances .some focuseed on productive condition,some geomantic omens and contiquity to the main houses that could provide shelter for them.The interior space layout was characterized with yard and patio inside, wall and corridor outside.A grent impact Kejia' s stytle of Tulou was reflected in the spatial characterises of civilian fortresses in southeast of Sichuan.In addition,there were other ways of layout,such as incompact arrangement with many accumulative points;linear arrangement with block and street; divergent arrangement with a centre.Mountain fortresses for civilian in the southeast of Sichuan have shown varieties in form and space.In general,there were two main functions.One was its defending system,which could distinguish from other local civilian houses;the other was the relations to ordinary life,which was the nature of civilianfortresses. Mountain fortresses for civilian residence in the southeast of Sichuan has a remarkabletrace of regional archtectural culture.Not only had they made great achievements in architectural technique and art,but also provided historical evidence for our study .The research and conservation of the civilian fortresses in the southeast of Sichuan are of academical and practical significance.