Ancestral Temple Street Shops

Ancestral Temple Street Shops

The Ancestral Temple Street Shops are a Foshan Municipal Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

Within the Lingnan Tiandi complex, a heritage site marked as “Ancestral Temple Street Shops” was once the most bustling marketplace in Foshan during the late Ming and early Qing dynasties. This area was the liveliest part of old Foshan, reaching its peak during the Qianlong reign of the Qing Dynasty.

Ancient illustrations from the “Foshan Zhongyi Township Chronicles” offer a vague glimpse of the shops that once stood here: they used to sell a variety of daily necessities, such as handicrafts like paper-cuttings, woodblock New Year paintings, pots and pans, Shiwan figurines, and ironware. Back then, Foshan was nationally renowned for its handicraft industries such as ceramics and metal casting, and the Ancestral Temple Street Shops were a concentrated showcase of the region’s cultural essence. Later, with the rise of industrialization in modern times, the shops fell into decline under the pressure of machine-made foreign goods and the turmoil of war. It was not until after the founding of the People’s Republic of China that traditional crafts were revived, gradually restoring the former vibrancy of Ancestral Temple Street.

According to officials from Foshan Lingnan Tiandi, during the Ming and Qing dynasties, residential buildings in Foshan were relatively concentrated, and most functioned as a combination of shop, workshop, and residence—shops downstairs with living quarters upstairs, or shops in front and residences in the back—becoming the typical form and streetscape of traditional Foshan shops. The granite “shop display stands,” L-shaped wooden counters, and wall-mounted miscellaneous shelves were unique features of business operations. In front of the Ancestral Temple Street Shops, there were usually altars dedicated to the Door God, Earth God, God of Fortune, and God of Wealth, while inside, there were ancestral tablets along with shrines for the Dragon King of the Well, the Kitchen God, and others—these all served as traditional architectural representations of the area’s thriving commerce and local customs.

In 1998, the Foshan Municipal People’s Government designated the Ancestral Temple Street Shops as a cultural relics protection unit. Today, the historic site has been revitalized and now stands facing the Lizhongshengtang building.