Ancient Chinese Bridges by Tang Huancheng

Abstract

TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE Book Reviews 151 Ancient Chinese Bridges. By Tang Huancheng. 2d ed. Beijing, 1987. Pp. 298; illustrations, diagrams. The first edition of this comprehensive and excellent work was published in 1958 in Chinese only. It was quoted in bridge histories written in Japanese and by Joseph Needham in Science and Civilisation in China. Long out of print, Tang Huancheng’s book has now been reissued including new material and a valuable descriptive text in English. The author expresses regret that Eastern scholars have neglected to publish in Western languages, as this has effectively prevented material from entering the mainstream of engineering historical writ­ ing, and his purpose in including an English text has been to help rectify this. Chapters spanning four millennia of recorded Chinese history deal with bridge origins, simply supported beams, cantilevers, combined arch-beam systems, houses on bridges, plankways laterally supported around cliffs, suspension systems, pontoon bridges, garden bridges, and bridge decoration, the last two dealing with aesthetics in Chinese iconography and construction. Tang is an eminent engineering designer, and his expertise is that of the professional builder. Much of his information derives from personal on-site discovery confirmed and supplemented by archival research. The text thus provides a wealth of hitherto unknown and unrecorded information on structural systems, dimensions, loading capacities, chronology, and statistics, as well as anecdotal material and information on the aging and survival of structures. Unusual techno­ logical feats are described, such as growing oysters on raft foundations in order to cement pier masonry together. Unfortunately there is neither a bibliography nor notes, but this cannot be considered a fault as the book is intended as an overview for the layman and not as a historical treatise. The most exciting chapters, which introduce material never before hinted at in any Western publication, are those on timber bridge construction and iron chain suspension systems, fields in which Chinese builders have excelled for millennia. Chinese development here fol­ lowed quite different paths from those trod elsewhere. The author presented a few of his most unusual timber examples in a poster session at the International Association of Bridge and Structural En­ gineers Conference in 1980 in Vienna where they excited lively profes­ sional interest, but this is the first time they are available in print. Material on the elegant Chinese stone arches—somewhat more fa­ miliar to the Westerner through tourist photographs—has been sup­ plemented here with technical information in the form of sketches and details of the highly refined stonecutting techniques and struc­ tural particulars that only a professional engineer could elucidate so clearly. The slenderness of many of these structures with their incred­ 152 Book Reviews TECHNOLOGY AND CULTURE ibly large ratio of arch opening to pier thickness never fails to amaze anyone who has even a passing acquaintance with the problems of thrust in bridge piers under construction. Some of the details suggest the inventive means used to achieve this ratio, and whet the appetite for more information than it has been possible to include in a general survey. The reader is left with a distinct need for more of the author’s excellent system sketches, more axonometric diagrams with dimen­ sions, and more detailed drawings of components and techniques which supplement the plenitude of photographs. It is rare indeed in any book on bridge history to find structures photographed and graphically annotated by someone who understands their structural problems. Many of the illustrations are aesthetically excellent, too, and it is regrettable that the printing cannot do them justice. The book opens a Pandora’s box of technical and historical questions that would require a set of tomes to answer; it introduces the reader to a culture of construction radically different from that to which we are accustomed. What is so tantalizing is that, far from merely rein­ forcing persistent notions about “Eastern” engineering technology, it expands our occidentalized view and affords glimpses of new struc­ tural horizons. Thus the work substantially increases our awareness and knowledge of one aspect of civil engineering history in China. It goes far deeper into the subject than Helge Fugl-Meyer (Chinese Bridges, Shanghai/Hong Kong/Singapore, 1937), Joseph Needham (Science and Civilisation in...