Wulajie: Courtyards and the Single Drum

A 2024 report from Jilin’s culture and tourism department listed the Three Wula Mansions—Kuifu, Houfu and Safu—among nine attractions opened for the National Day holiday. The listing gives the story three named places, rather than one generic old courtyard.

A different courtyard often associated with Jilin Manchu culture stands in the city center. It is the former residence of Wang Baichuan, built in 1932 and later used for the Jilin Manchu Museum. Its two-entry layout separates a front courtyard, with the gatehouse and side rooms, from a rear court where the main house faced the side wings. A flower gate and screen wall marked the passage between them; a covered corridor linked the rooms. The museum occupies this separate urban house, with a history distinct from Wulajie’s Sa and Hou compounds.

In 2026, the provincial government approved Wulajie Manchu Town’s 2024–2035 historic-town protection plan. The approval calls for stronger protection and repair of immovable cultural relics and historic buildings. It sets a town-wide direction; it does not document completed repairs at any named mansion.

The Wula Chen Han Banner single-drum dance belongs to the family rites of the Chang and Zhang lineages. The official heritage record says the Chang family calls it “single drum,” while the Zhang family calls it “Taiping drum.” The dancer carries a hand drum and moves the waist so that thirty-two hanging bells strike against one another. The drum answers their bright, dry rhythm; the feet keep changing the pattern.

The record gives varied footwork examples: a shuffling T-step, a turning circle, three small steps forward followed by one back, and steps in place. Movement begins in the feet, travels through the waist, and sets the bells sounding; the hands strike the drum in reply. This is not an anonymous drum dance or a generalized sign of Manchu culture. It is a named performance tied to family ritual, with its own objects, counts and vocabulary of movement.

The Wula Chen Han Banner single-drum dance was included in 2011 in the third national list of intangible cultural heritage as an expanded project. The record names the Jilin City Art Research Institute as its protection unit. That designation gives the family-linked practice an institutional custodian, while the project description keeps its Chang and Zhang family lineages distinct. It does not turn a household rite into a scheduled stage performance.