2. Courtyard residences: Confucian ideology in residential design

Confucian ideology was the core of feudal China's hierarchical social system.

Traditional courtyard residences were strongly influenced by the hierarchical Confucianism code of conduct, which drew strict distinctions between interior and exterior, superior and inferior, and male and female. (The conduct was an institutionalized system of rules that governed all interpersonal relations in China's feudal society and whose basic function was to set up and maintain China's hierarchal social system.) These courtyard compounds were a world apart, enclosed and isolated from the outside world, and serving as material expressions of Confucian ideology.

Ink drawing of a typical courtyard residence

In traditional Chinese architecture, the center was considered to be superior and the sides as inferior; the north was superior and the south inferior; the left was superior and the right inferior; and the front was superior and the back inferior.

In courtyard residences, the north wing was the most desirable because it faced south and received the most sunlight. The center room of the north wing, as the most esteemed location, served as the living room or the ancestral hall. The grandparents occupied the east rooms of the north wing and the head of the family, the west rooms. The east and west wings were the residences of the younger generation. The eldest son and his family lived in the east wing, and the younger sons and their families lived in the west wing. The south wing housed guest rooms, studies, kitchens, and storerooms.

Page:

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8