Sacrificial Rites Martial Temple, Tainan台南祀典武庙

Type

Temples and Abbeys (Gongguan)

Location

Taiwan, China · Taiwan · West Central District, Tainan · No. 229, Section 2, Yongfu Road, beside the Grand Mazu Temple

Coordinates

22.9964, 120.202 Map ↗

School

Daoism in Taiwan

First built

One account gives 1665 (19th year of the Yongli reign of Ming); another gives 1663 · Built by Zheng Jing, originally called the Guandi Temple; in the third year of the Yongzheng era (1725) the Qing court ennobled three generations of Lord Guan's ancestors as dukes and, by imperial order, upgraded the temple to official sacrificial status, renaming it the "Sacrificial Rites Martial Temple."

Heritage status

National Historic Site (1983)

Overview

The Sacrificial Rites Martial Temple, Tainan was built by Zheng Jing of the Ming loyalist Zheng regime; the mainstream account gives its founding year as the nineteenth year of the Yongli era (1665), though another account gives 1663. It principally enshrines Lord Guan (Guansheng Dijun), with Crown Prince Guan Ping and General Zhou Cang as attendant deities, and its rear hall, the Hall of Three Generations, honors Lord Guan's three generations of ancestors. In 1690 Wang Xiaozong, Circuit Intendant of Taiwan and Xiamen, restored the temple and reoriented its gate to face south; it was further expanded in 1716. In the third year of the Yongzheng era (1725), the Qing court, by imperial decree, ennobled three generations of Lord Guan's ancestors as dukes, and the temple was upgraded by imperial order to an officially sanctioned sacrificial temple, renamed the "Sacrificial Rites Martial Temple," with the state sponsoring three major rites a year — making it the only Guandi temple in all of Taiwan included in the official sacrificial rites register. The temple faces south in a three-courtyard layout; the vermilion gable wall along Yongfu Road runs about sixty-six meters, and its roofline rises and falls in three tiers over the front hall, worship hall, main hall, and rear hall, forming a landmark of the Tainan streetscape. The plaque at the main gate reading "A True Man" (Da Zhangfu) was donated during the Qianlong era by Yang Tingli, magistrate of Taiwan county, quoting from the Mencius, "Teng Wen Gong II," and is counted among the famous plaques of the old walled city. The temple's cult of the Old Man under the Moon (Yuelao) is especially popular, and it is counted as one of Tainan's "Four Great Yuelao" shrines. It was listed as a first-batch first-grade historic monument on December 28, 1983, and is today a nationally designated historic monument.

Highlights

• The "Da Zhangfu" ("A True Man") plaque
• The vermilion gable wall and three-tiered roofline
• The only officially sanctioned Guandi temple in Taiwan
• The Yuelao (Old Man under the Moon) shrine