Duiyue Gate Audio Guide

Duiyue Gate: what does the audio guide cover?

1. 01

   Welcome to Redemption gate

   Welcome to Redemption gate, a historic city gate in the West Central District of Tainan. Its local name is 兌悅門. You will find it on Xinyi Street, and it is a rare thing in this city: a gate that is still in use. Cars, scooters and people on foot pass through it as they go about their day. The records on this particular gate are modest. So alongside the gate itself, I will tell you the story of the world around it: the walls of Qing-era Tainan, the busy port district just beyond them, and why a gate like this mattered. Where I speak about the area rather than the gate, I will make that clear. Take a moment to look at the stonework before we begin. Locals call this the Coral Stone Gate, and the name tells you something about what you are standing in front of.

2. 02

   Redemption gate and the Walls of Tainan

   To understand this gate, picture Tainan under Qing rule. The Qing rulers had been building walls around the city since the 1720s. Defense against foreign invaders was one reason. Another was that rebellion against the Qing government was commonplace, so walls were meant to protect the city from threats inside the island as well as outside it. But Tainan kept growing, and the important port area known as the Five Channels district sat outside those walls. Redemption gate was completed in 1836 to answer that situation. It was not part of the main city walls. It belonged to the outlying walls that reached out to take in the western, waterside side of town. That makes it a different kind of gate from the grand ones. Tainan once had a Great West Gate, but it is long gone. The Small West Gate survives, though it was moved to the campus of National Cheng Kung University in the east of the city. This gate is the one that still stands where it was built.

3. 03

   The Coral Stone Gate and the Waterways

   Now look closely at the stone, because it gives the gate its popular name: the Coral Stone Gate, or in Chinese, 咾咕石城門. It is also known as the Rocky Gate. The coral stone is a clue to the world this gate belonged to. This part of Tainan was once connected to waterways, and ships carried stones along them. The stone you see is tied to that maritime past. The gate stood at the edge of the Five Channels district, a trading and port zone, so the sea and its traffic were never far away. Standing here, you can imagine the activity around it: boats, cargo and merchants moving between the harbor side and the walled city. Today the waterways have changed with the landscape, and the gate's meaning has shifted with them. It began as a piece of the city's defenses and now stands as a piece of its memory.

4. 04

   A Name Written in the Eight Trigrams

   The name of Redemption gate carries a little philosophy. The local name, 兌悅門, begins with the character Dui, which comes from the Bagua, the eight trigrams used in traditional Chinese thought. In that diagram, Dui is associated with the west, and it is also linked with joy. The second character, yue, means delight or pleasure. So the name points to the gate's position on the western side of the city, and it does so with a wish for good fortune. Traditional Chinese place names often work this way, joining direction and blessing in a few characters. The gate is also a living part of the street today. It is the only city gate in the district still in use, so you can walk or ride through the same opening that people have used for generations. Not many heritage monuments let you do that.

5. 05

   Before You Head Off

   Before you move on, step through the gate once, then turn and look back. Notice how the stone frames the street, and think about the old Five Channels district just beyond the walls. This part of the West Central District rewards slow walking. Shennong Street, once known as Beishi Street, is nearby, and it is described as the most well preserved old street in Tainan. Fengsheng Temple, first built in 1739, is part of the same historic neighborhood. Ask yourself what this corner of the city looked like when ships and stones moved through its waterways. Every lane here seems to have an answer, and a little curiosity will help you find it.