Shiqiu Fishing Songs

Item name and level

The Shiqiu Fishing Songs appear in Appendix 2, the district-level ICH list, of the third batch of district-level ICH material, which states that the list contains 22 items in total; the name given there is "Shijiu Fishing Songs".

According to a reply of 28 November 2023 from the Lishui District Culture and Tourism Bureau, eight projects were reported as entering the municipal-level representative ICH list in January 2023, among them Tiger-head Shoes, Hand-torn Chicken, Mingjue Pickled Greens, Helinfang Twin Dragons, Shrimp Lantern Dance and Shiqiu Fishing Songs. In the reply the project is written as the Shiqiu Fishing Songs.

The fifth batch of the list of representative items of intangible cultural heritage of Nanjing, published on 20 January 2023 by the Nanjing Municipal People's Government under Ning Zheng Fa [2023] No. 11, carries the entry "Shijiu Fishing Songs", number NJ-II-13, serial number 8, in the category of traditional music, with Lishui District as the applying area or unit, listed alongside "Jiangning Folk Songs" of Jiangning District and the like in the same category. This entry therefore records the level as municipal and the item type as traditional music, with the fifth batch and the publication date of January 2023, and the project number is verifiable.

Points in doubt

The same name is written differently in two places: Appendix 2 of the third-batch district list and the published fifth municipal batch both give "Shijiu Fishing Songs", while the bureau reply gives "Shiqiu Fishing Songs". The two place-name elements are written with different characters. Each wording is reproduced as it stands, without being merged or rewritten; the title of this entry follows the district reply, and the formal project name is the "Shijiu Fishing Songs" given in the published municipal and district documents. The two are treated here as the same project, on the ground that both are traditional music, both belong to Lishui, and both appear in the district and the municipal list, but the difference in wording is not explained.

The municipal list gives only the project name, number, category and applying area or unit; it gives no introduction, no bearers and no guardian unit, so the guardian unit is still to be verified.

To be added

The tunes and lyrics, the occasions and the number of singers, the accompanying instruments, the area and the number of generations through which the songs have passed, the bearers and the guardian unit are all absent from the cited sources. Neither cited document records the content of the songs or the way they are performed; both give the project name and its listing status only.