Bagua Fortress

Bagua Fortress

Bagua Fortress is actually not a single earthen building, but a colloquial name for a five-ring, bagua (Eight Trigrams)-shaped residential complex. It is located in Dongping Village, ShenTu Town, Zhangpu County, Zhangzhou. Dongping is a mountain village at an altitude of over 300 meters, accessible only via a winding dirt road that zigzags up the hill — rugged and uneven, with rocks scattered all over the mountainside in all shapes and sizes, some as small as a bucket and others as large as a house. This rocky mountain is called Zao Mountain.

Bagua Fortress was built on a flat area atop Zao Mountain during the mid-Qing Dynasty, about 300 years ago. Unlike typical tulou (earthen buildings), it is not enclosed but completely open. Viewed from above, the fortress consists of five concentric rings of single-story houses surrounding a common center. The innermost ring is a complete circular building with just 14 uniformly sized rooms. The fourth ring follows a broken bagua layout with 25 rooms, while the third, second, and outer rings share similar arrangements. Each ring is spaced three meters apart, forming a circular courtyard that also serves as the passage for entering and exiting. Notably, Bagua Fortress does not have an ancestral hall — a rare feature among tulou. Over time, parts of the fortress walls have deteriorated, and when repaired, people used stone and bricks instead of rammed earth. Legend has it that when the fortress was originally built, the family clan was small and finances were limited, so only one story was constructed.

ShenTu Town: Located in the southeastern part of Zhangpu County, ShenTu Town borders Huxi and Chitu townships to the north, Chihu Town to the east, Jiuzhen Town to the west, Zhuyu Salt Field and Liulao Town to the south, and faces Jiangjun Bay to the southeast. The terrain is higher in the north and lower in the south. The highest area is Dongping Village, situated beneath the main peak of Zao Mountain (elevation 580 meters), while the southern part around ShenTu Village is a coastal plain. The town covers a total area of 701 square kilometers and has an 84-kilometer-long coastline.

ShenTu Town is a major agricultural hub. The town has a total of 40,064 mu of arable land. In recent years, agricultural infrastructure — especially water conservancy projects — has been strengthened. The town has implemented initiatives with a total investment of... More detailed information about ShenTu Town++