Tomb of Huang Daopo

　　The Tomb of Huang Daopo is situated at No. 13, Dongwan Village (the former site of Wuni Jing Town), Huajing Town, on the north side of the outer ring road ramp near Xupu Bridge. It faces south and covers an area of over 1,000 square meters. The tomb complex features two levels of terraced steps. The burial mound is encircled by a 50-centimeter-high marble retaining wall, with an oval-shaped stone-lined earthen grave in the center. In front of the tomb stands a white marble gravestone, the front of which bears the handwritten inscription “Tomb of Huang Daopo of the Yuan Dynasty” by Wei Wenbo, former Secretary of the Shanghai Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China. The back of the gravestone is engraved with an epitaph. In front of the gravestone is a long rectangular stone offering table and stone benches. The surroundings of the tomb are planted with evergreen trees such as pine, boxwood, pagoda tree, and yew, enclosed by white walls on three sides. The entire burial site appears simple and solemn.

　　Huang Daopo, also known as Huang Po, Huang Siniang, or Qiao Gu, was born at the turn of the Song and Yuan dynasties in Wuni Jing Town. Coming from a poor family in her early years, she was forced to become a child bride at around the age of twelve or thirteen. Later, she wandered to Liuzhou (Hainan Island), where she spent several decades learning the skills of cotton planting and weaving from the Li ethnic people. After returning to her hometown in her later years, she actively engaged in the cotton textile industry. Combining the techniques she learned in Hainan with traditional Han weaving methods, she improved textile tools and passed on these advanced tools and techniques to local women. This helped promote the widespread sale of local cotton textiles and spurred the development and prosperity of the textile industry in the Songjiang area. By the Ming dynasty, the Songjiang region had become the national hub for cotton cloth production.

　　Huang Daopo was an outstanding female textile technology innovator in ancient China. She was from Wuni Jing, Songjiang Prefecture (now Huajing Town, Xuhui District). Legend has it that she traveled to Yazhou (now Hainan Province), where she learned the complete set of cotton textile techniques from the Li people, refined and innovated upon them, and then returned to her hometown during the Yuanzhen era to teach these skills. She made a creative contribution to the development of China’s textile technology and helped establish Shanghai as the textile industry center of China at the time.

　　Originally built during the Yuan dynasty, the tomb has undergone several changes over the years. In 1957, it was restored by the Shanghai Municipal People’s Government, and a memorial stele was erected. The front of the stele is inscribed with “Tomb of Huang Daopo, Textile Artist of the Yuan Dynasty,” while the back provides a detailed account of her life. In 1962, it was renovated again, and a white marble gravestone was erected. It has been further restored in recent years. The site is surrounded by trees such as pine, boxwood, pagoda tree, and yew, along with a fence featuring floral-patterned windows and drip tiles. The platform is paved with blue bricks, with an oval-shaped earthen grave in the center. In front of the tomb are an offering table and stone benches, with the 1957 stele located to the right front, the 1962 stele in the middle, giving the site a solemn and dignified atmosphere. In 1984, it underwent another major restoration, covering an area of one mu, with a circular stone-lined earthen grave, a blue brick floor, and three-sided enclosing walls. A white marble gravestone inscribed with “Tomb of Huang Daopo of the Yuan Dynasty” in the calligraphy of Wei Wenbo was erected in front of the tomb. In 1987, it was designated as a municipal-level cultural relics protection unit.