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Title:
Regional Network and Cult Assemblage: The Temple of Medicine King in Qizhou and the Construction of Popular Belief in North China during the Ming-Qing Period
Abstract:
The medicinal market in Qizhou was the most important distribution center for herbal medicines in North China during the Qing dynasty. However, the Temple of Medicine King in Qizhou enshrined a unique god of medicine that was not usually seen in other places. This paper argues that the regional network of cults and market in North China must be taken into account in understanding the formationof the folk cult in Qizhou. First, in the latter half of the 15th century, a magistrate introduced a folk belief that originated in the Song dynasty to the Qizhou temple. This seemingly independent event was closely related to the revival of the Pichang cult in North China, which cannot be seen as a direct descendent of the cult from the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty, but a new tradition reintroduced from the Jiangnan Region. Second, the similarity between the Qizhou temple and another temple enshrining a Han general Pi Tong in the neighboring prefecture finally contributed to the convergence of the two cult traditions. Finally, the competition between the markets in Qizhou and Maozhou facilitated the adoption of Pi Tong as the new identity of Medicine King among Qizhou merchants. In sum, the multiple identities of the Medicine King and its transformation cannot be explained as merely a temporal accumulation or a pure local construction. Rather, it is a “cult assemblage” that synthesizes several different cult traditions in North China.
