Pacifying the Winter Winds: The Talismanic Towers of the Penghu Islands

As a way to protect against harsh weather patterns and to procure blessings for the community, villages throughout the islands of Penghu have installed and consecrated small stone towers. More than forty towers in total, many of these structures reside on the coastline, high upon cliffs, overlooking the seas. Others appear behind temples, in high places, or, in a few cases, a distance out into the ocean water. Research to date has indicated that nearly all of the towers underwent repairs in the first half of the twentieth century, suggesting that the original towers first date from the late Qing period (1644–1911). Nearly half of the towers have embedded into their surfaces stone tablets (*shibei* 石碑) with carved inscriptions; these short epigraphs may provide the date of the latest rebuild, the name of the tower, the name of one or several deities, and, in some instances, a talismanic decree (*fuling* 符令). With a primary focus on the latter two categories, this paper explores relationships between talismanic inscriptions on these stone towers and local religion in Penghu. By studying historical, epigraphical, and ethnographic data compiled by Penghu scholars, together with new fieldwork, this paper argues that these inscriptions and the rituals that empower them reflect a local expression of a Daoist cosmos. This vision positions supreme and stellar gods of the Daoist pantheon as the ultimate source of divine power and the deified dead of the local soil as the spiritual entities who make this power manifest in the lives of the people. 

This study brings the author’s original fieldwork into a conversation with data compiled and published by Penghu scholars in previous decades. Within this latter category, Huang Youxing and Gan Cunji have published several volumes on local religion in Penghu, including a detailed study of the archipelago’s stone towers, Penghu’s Towers for Dispelling Disasters and Praying for Blessings (*Penghu de bixie qifu ta* 澎湖的辟邪祈福塔). In their study of the stone towers, Huang and Gan not only provide detailed statistics on the material composition and dimensions for each tower, but they also interview more than four hundred Penghu residents. They use this ethnographic data to provide a rich local history for each tower and their respective villages. Several sections of the book also include vivid descriptions of the ritual processes that took place when the towers were built and underwent consecration. More recently, in the summer of 2023, the author conducted fieldwork on the archipelago, exploring the layout and inscriptions of several tower sites and observing ritual performances at several local temples. 

According to Huang and Gan, communities first built the towers as a way to mitigate the effects of Penghu’s harsh weather patterns. Due to poor soil quality, fierce winter winds, and frequent bouts of saline rain, farmers have a difficult time earning a living on the archipelago. Accordingly, fishing has become the primary industry. But this has meant that villagers, most often men in particular, have had to face the dangers of the sea and its storms. For centuries, the mainstream perception regards these harsh weather patterns as manifestations of malevolent *qi*, invisible forces that the talismanic towers might combat. In their book, Huang and Gan identify twelve primary reasons for building the stone towers, according to local testimonials. These include the suppression of malevolent qi, for example, the preservation of wealth, and protection against mountain spirits. In almost all cases, the towers have functions similar to Daoist talismans and related efficacious Daoist symbols. As for the dating of these stone towers, ethnographic data from local villagers suggest that most of the towers have their origins in the late Qing period. 

As its central example, this paper shows how an inscribed talisman on the Three Immortals Tower of Wai’an Village serves as a reflection of local practice in Penghu temples. Through a combination of esoteric symbol and standard script characteristic of Daoist talismans, the tower’s talismanic inscription reads, “May the Three Pure Ones, the Jade Sovereign, and the Stellar Lords of the Southern and Northern Dippers by imperial decree grant Royal Lord Wen the power to grant children, bring wealth, and suppress malevolent qi.” In its textual and pictorial components, the talisman offers a local vision of a Daoist cosmos, with supreme, imperial, and stellar Daoist gods as the source of divine power, conceived as above and within the firmament. These high-ranking entities confer divine power to the local tutelary god Wenfu Wangye, who has a close connection to the common people and their concerns. Meanwhile, in a commonplace temple ritual known as the Presentation of Incense, local wangye deities descend into the bodies of spirit mediums and lead the temple community in a formal offering of incense to the Jade Sovereign, a deity near the apex of the Daoist cosmos. After the gift of incense to the Jade Sovereign, the local gods, through the bodies of their mediums, transmit messages and perform healing rites for the people.

In its primary aim, this paper shows how the talismanic inscriptions reflect a local expression of a Daoist cosmos. At the same time, in presenting the ritual processes intended to make sacred and efficacious the towers and their inscriptions, this paper offers new ways to imagine rituals that may have accompanied similar inscription practices from earlier periods in Chinese history. The stone inscriptions carry with them traces of their makers: the Ritual Masters who draft the talismans and the craftsmen who chisel them, sometimes with much trepidation. The inscriptions also carry with them traces of the deities who decide where and when the stone tablets should be made. We indeed glean much insight from the visible and manifest aspects of stone inscriptions, that is, their material and semantic aspects. But I hope to show that we also have much to learn from their invisible and latent aspects, no longer apparent to our eyes, but nonetheless there, forever bound to basalt stone and carved shapes and symbols.