Chinese Festivals in Hong Kong
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Hung-chiu Ceremony in Kam Tsin
(The 18th and 19th days of the first lunar month)
Kam Tsin is a village in Sheung Shui of the New Territories whose natives are surnamed
Hau. According to Hugh Baker's study of the settlement history of the Haus, the Haus
arrived at the New Territories around the end of the twelfth century, in Southern
Sung Dynasty. They initially settled in Ho Sheung Heung village. Later, the lineage
split into another three branch-villages of Kam Tsin, Yin Kong and Ping Kong. (Baker,
1966, p. 26)
Link between Kam Tsin and the other three Haus' villages is generally loose. Baker
pointed out that there is quite a geographical distance between these four villages.
Although they recognized kinship shared by four villages, observed obligations of
mutual aid and held certain joint property nominally, they are politically four
distinct units under four leaderships, mutually exclusive. In view of this relation,
Baker considers the Haus in Kam Tsin as a clan instead of a lineage, as he defines
"lineage" as a group of agnatically related males together with their unmarried
female agnates and wives of the male, living in a single settlement, holding property
in common, and politically under one leadership, whereas, he defines "clan" as an
aggregate of all such groups in the area bearing a common surname and recognizing
a recent, traceable common origin, but yet not necessarily owning property in common
nor united under one leadership unit. (Baker, 1966, pp. 25-6)
Recent studies show that the Haus in Kam Tsin have common property with other three
villages. Tam Sze-man notes that the Haus in Kam Tsin village are descendants of
two ancestral branches, Ch'euk Fung tso originated from Ho Sheung Heung village and
Tik Kat tso from Ping Kong village. The descendants of these two branches living
in the same Kam Tsin village are aware of each own branch distinction, therefore,
the single ancestral hall built by the Tik Kat tso branch is never regarded by another
branch as a public building for the whole village. Also, the Ch'euk Fung tso branch
of Kam Tsin has never cut its ties with Haus of the same branch in Yin Kong village.
This intra-branch bondage is especially obvious when organizing ancestral grave
worship. Nevertheless, the two branches established an ancestral communal trust,
in the name of the Tsung Fuk Tong that controls a Fuk Tak temple, also called Tsung
Fuk Shan-T'eng. It is the most important public building for the two Haus branches
of Kam Tsin. (Tam, 2003, pp. 79-92.)
The Tsung Fuk Tong unites the two Haus branches of Kam Tsin. They co-operate to
organize the hung-ch'ao ceremony at the beginning of each year. David Faure has
pointed out that where a communal ceremony is held, the entire village or a group
of villages forms into a single worshipping society. (Faure, 1986, p. 74.) The unity
between the two branches of Kam Tsin village during the hung-ch'ao ceremony is an
example. In preparing for the organization of hung-ch'ao ceremony, Tsung Fuk Tong
keeps a register of households of all the Haus in Kam Tsin. These households are
grouped into ten kaap (groups). By rotation, one kap takes charge of the overall
management of the ceremony of the year, including collecting money from all
households for the miscellaneous expenses in the ceremony. It is possible that in
the past, the kaap of the year also took care of the village's general management.
The two Haus branches of Kam Tsin were then united under one leadership politically,
and the hung-ch'ao ceremony provides a good occasion for developing unity.
I have observed from the hung-ch'ao ceremony in Fan Ling that, hung-ch'iu is in
essence a tso-she ("doing the she), a special celebration for the taai-wong at the
beginning or end of the year. Taai-wong are territorial deities, thought to be
spirits of localities where they stand. Villagers living in respective localities
organize communal worship for taai-wong, asking for their protection. (See the
article on hung-ch'ao ceremony in Fan Ling) The hung-ch'ao ceremony in Kam Tsin is
performed inside Tsung Fuk Shan-T'eng, the temple devoted to Fuk Tak, which is
another name of taai-wong.
The hung-ch'ao ceremony in Kam Tsin is to a large extent similar to the ceremony
in Fan Ling, only that 'scramble for rooster feathers' and 'chanting the hemp-song'
are absent.
References:
Hugh D. R. Baker, "The Five Great Clans of the New Territories," Journal of the Hong
Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. 6 (1966), pp. 25-48.
David Faure, The Structure of Chinese Rural Society: Lineage and Village in the
Eastern New Territories, Hong Kong, Oxford University Press, 1986.
Tam Sze Man, Xianggang Xinjie Houzu de jianggou: zongzu zhuzhi yu defang zhengzhi
he minjian zongjiao de guanxi (Construction of the "Hou Lineage" in the New
Territories of Hong Kong: lineage organization, popular religion and local politics),
Unpublished MPhil. Thesis, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2003.
Author: Dr. Sui-wai Cheung
Date: June, 2005
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