The peach blossom spring's long history as a sacred site in northern Hunan

Abstract

Though long seen uniquely from the perspective of the Chinese literary canon, Tao Qian's {Chinese language presented}(365?-427) famous "Record of the Peach Blossom Spring"("Taohuayuan ji"{Chinese language presented}) may find an even more fruitful disciplinary home in religious studies. The story refers itself to a grotto at Wuling {Chinese language presented}(present-day northern Hunan province), a site that has been associated with Daoist transcendents (shenxian {Chinese language presented}) at least since the middle of the sixth century. A Daoist monastery on that same site, the Peach Spring Abbey (Taoyuan guan {Chinese language presented}) or Peach Blossom Abbey (Taohua guan {Chinese language presented}), became officially recognized in 748 and received imperial support not long after. This article studies the long history of Peach Spring as a sacred site, or, as Tao Qian referred to it in his poem, a "divine realm"(shenjie {Chinese language presented}).