The Trembling Brush: Five Centuries of Seismic Records, Disaster Perception, and Social Resilience in Zhangzhou
In Southern Fujian, the earth has not always been a silent foundation. Zhangzhou — an ancient city famed for the prosperity of Moon Harbor — was repeatedly shaken by tremors deep within the crust. In 1445, the earliest documented earthquake struck the prefectural city. In 1591, city walls collapsed and the earth split open. In 1604, a magnitude 8.0 quake off the coast of Quanzhou rocked the entire region. I opened the Wanli Zhangzhou Prefecture Chronicle and the Zhangzhou Seismological Chronicle. In the volume on “Portents and Disasters,” I saw how our ancestors captured the “turning of the Earth Dragon” with cold, precise numbers. ...