Maming Village

Maming Village

Maming Village in Tongxiang City, Jiaxing, is a typical water town village on the plains of the Jiangnan region, located in the central part of the Hangjiahu Plain in the Yangtze River Delta. It is also one of the few remaining places in Tongxiang that still preserves the original slow-paced rural life of Jiangnan, where you can experience the authentic charm of traditional Jiangnan village life.

In Zhouquan’s Maming Village, there is an old street with a history of over a hundred years, called Maming Old Street. The street is very short—you only need to walk about 50 steps from one end to the other—and very narrow, too narrow for cars to pass through. But this old street is definitely the cultural and economic hub of the village. The residents who live along the old street lead leisurely lives, maintaining their simple and unadorned ways just as they were decades ago. They gather at the market, drink tea, eat noodles, chat, and play cards here. The hustle and bustle outside the old street has nothing to do with them. This is one of the few remaining places in Jiangnan that still retains the original characteristics of a slow-paced rural life.

The various buildings along the old street are a microcosm of Jiangnan life—teahouses, butcher shops, grocery stores, barbershops. Amid the wear of time, the red paint on the wooden houses gradually fades, while the color of the stone-paved road grows ever deeper.

The busiest time of day on the old street is around three or four in the morning. As dawn breaks and the sounds of crowing roosters and barking dogs fill the air, the teahouses are packed with patrons. Wisps of steam and drifting trails of smoke intertwine, as if time itself has come to a standstill.

At the end of Maming Old Street stands Maming Temple, which holds the legend behind the village’s name. It is said that when Emperor Qianlong traveled to Jiangnan, he passed through Maming and, while crossing a bridge called “Jiaoma Bridge,” his horse neighed three times toward the opposite bank of the river. Curious, the emperor looked over and spotted an old temple. Delighted, he immediately inscribed a plaque with the words “Maming Old Temple.” Later, the village where the old temple was located came to be known as Maming Village.

Maming Village is also a bona fide thousand-year-old ancient settlement. According to records, there are two ancient cultural sites within the current boundaries of Maming Village: the Zhujia Dam Site and the Datieqiao Site. Both date back to the Shang-Zhou and Han dynasties, and numerous pottery fragments have been unearthed there. “The archaeological discoveries at these two sites prove that human activity existed in the Maming area as early as the Shang and Zhou periods.”

Surrounded by water on all sides, Maming Village is the perfect place described in Meng Haoran’s poem: “Mooring the boat amid misty islets.” Though small, the village carries the distinctive features of a classic Jiangnan water town, with winding waterways crisscrossing the landscape and stone arch bridges linking together the long past and present of the ancient settlement.

In 2016, the local government carried out preservation and development work in Maming Village. Not only was the timeless charm and traditional appearance of Maming Old Street fully preserved, but the facades and courtyards of the villagers’ homes were also beautified and renovated. In the same year, Maming Village was selected as one of the “Top Ten Most Beautiful Villages in Zhejiang” in a competition hosted by the Zhejiang Tourism Bureau under the theme “Poetic Zhejiang · Beautiful Countryside.” It was the only village from the Jiaxing area to receive this honor.