Cijin Tianhou Temple Audio Guide

Cijin Tianhou Temple: what does the audio guide cover?

1. 01

   Welcome to Cijin Tianhou Temple

   Welcome to Cijin Tianhou Temple, known locally as 旗後天后宮 and affectionately called the Cijin Mazu Temple. You are on Cijin, the narrow island district of Kaohsiung that shelters the harbor mouth, in the old fishing quarter called Qihou. This is where the story of Kaohsiung begins, and the temple sits at the center of it. The temple honors Mazu, the goddess of the sea, protector of fishermen and sailors. It stands on Miaoqian Road, which means Temple Front Road, and the name fits. For centuries the road ran from the temple's doorstep straight down to the harbor wharf. Today the temple is a designated municipal monument, and it is still a place of incense and prayer, not a museum piece. Over the next few stops we will follow a typhoon-blown fisherman, walk through the carved stone and brick of the building, and meet the stone tablets and fishermen's donations that tie this temple to the working harbor. Let's start in the year 1673.

2. 02

   A Typhoon, a Fisherman and Six Families at Cijin Tianhou Temple

   The founding story goes back to 1673, the twenty-seventh year of the Yongli reign under the Ming Zheng regime. A Fujian fisherman named Xu Ahua was caught at sea by a typhoon and swept toward Qihou. Instead of disaster, he found an excellent fishing ground. He sailed home, then returned with six families from his home region, surnamed Cai, Hong, Wang, Li, Bai and Pan. They brought with them a portion of the spirit of Mazu, divided from the Mazu temple at Meizhou, and set it in a simple thatched hut on the spot where the temple stands today. They called it the Mazu Temple. That is why it is remembered as the earliest temple to Mazu in Kaohsiung. The settlement grew. From 1691 more and more people crossed the sea to live in Qihou, and much of the land was ownerless, so residents rushed to claim it. Xu Ahua worried the temple grounds would be swallowed up, so he and the six families marked out the boundaries: 29 zhang long and 19 zhang wide, a traditional measure of length. They wrote it into a land development contract for later generations to uphold. A sacred site was protected by paperwork as well as prayer.

3. 03

   Stone, Brick and Timber at Cijin Tianhou Temple

   The temple follows the southern Chinese tradition: a stone foundation, brick walls and a timber roof. Its layout has two main halls linked by a worship hall, with a protective chamber on each side. Before you step in, notice the custom of entering through the left side of the three-door entrance hall and leaving through the right. It is called the green dragon on the left and the white tiger on the right. Look down at the three granite steps leading up from the forecourt. They are built from ballast stones, the heavy stones used to weigh down boats on the crossing from the mainland in 1673. Past the entrance, the stonework is a gallery in itself: dragon pillars, a dragon wall, a tiger wall, stone lions and relief carvings, all done in different techniques. The roof carries the swallowtail ridge, with two dragons facing an old immortal, and the building is rich in wood carving, stone carving, painted sculpture and cut-and-paste ceramic work. The red-brick forecourt had a working life too. In the old Takao days it was where fishing nets were spread out to dry and where rafts and nets were mended. On festival days it becomes the audience area for open-air opera and the place where offering tables are set out.

4. 04

   Rebuilding and Survival at Cijin Tianhou Temple

   The temple you see is the product of many rebuildings. Villagers pooled funds to rebuild it in the Qianlong era of the eighteenth century. The first large-scale renovation came in 1887. In 1926, a worshipper named Cai Jiliu launched another rebuild, and that work fixed the building's character as we know it. Then came the Second World War. In that era, the temple escaped American bombing raids. In 1948, local people raised money for a major overhaul, and the fishermen's association contributed by donating oil, passing money that fishermen paid for fuel to the temple. It is a neat reminder that this was a fishermen's temple in the most practical sense. The work was led by master carpenter Cai Dingshan. He kept the original layout, raised the foundation by three chi, the traditional Chinese foot, and extended the protective chambers forward. Skilled craftsmen were hired, including Zhang Mucheng for the stone carving and Chen Yufeng for the painted decoration. It was listed as a monument in 1985, and today it is a municipal monument. A three-year restoration was completed in 2020, and the next year, on the sixteenth of October, the deities were ceremonially seated back in their places.

5. 05

   Before You Head Off at Cijin Tianhou Temple

   Before you go, look for two stone tablets that hold the harbor's history. One, set up in 1859, records an agreement among boat owners. Takao harbor was full of shallows and hidden reefs and could not take many ships at once, so they agreed to help one another. The other, from 1867, was raised after the port opened in 1863, when local officials were demanding bribes from people passing through. Complaints to the authorities led to a notice warning those officials to stop. Inside, the temple still keeps incense burners, offering tables, plaques, hanging bells and king boats, objects that carry the memory of this fishing settlement. In the Qing period the street running from the temple to the wharf was lined with shops and was once among the busiest places in Kaohsiung. In the Japanese period a vegetable market stood at the temple front. To reach it, you can take the Kaohsiung Mass Rapid Transit Orange Line to Sizihwan station, walk about five minutes to the Gushan ferry pier, cross to Cijin, and walk straight ahead. As you walk, ask yourself what the street might have looked like when it ran from the temple to the boats.