Six Millennia of Restraint: The Fishing Soul of Xiangshan

The Moment a Thousand Ships Set Sail, Shipu Harbor Went Silent

September in Shipu Harbor. Two thousand fishing boats moored bow to stern, every engine killed. A tremendous silence pressed down on the water — the final thirty seconds before the Kaiyu Festival's launch ceremony.

Fishing lanterns hung from every bow, a 4,000-year-old tradition of “using light to attract fish.” The sea-sacrifice ritual had just ended; fishermen's wives still knelt at the shore, foreheads pressed against sun-baked stone. I stood in the crowd, breathing in diesel fumes mixed with incense smoke — the truest scent of Xiangshan's fishing culture.

“Set sail!” The horn sounded. A thousand boats surged forward. But here's the detail most people miss: after the sacrifice prayer, children carried baskets of baby fish to the sea and released them. Take from the sea, return to the sea.

That release — that's the key to understanding six millennia of Xiangshan. They weren't taking. They were trading.

Six Thousand Years Ago, Someone Pressed a Shell into Clay

In the Tashan site display case sits an unremarkable piece of reddish sand-tempered pottery — bearing the imprint of a seashell. Six thousand years. The imprint is still there.

I stared at it for a long time. The early settlers didn't just use shells as tools and toss them — they pressed them into clay, fixing the shape of the sea permanently in earth. This is China's earliest marine art, and its earliest “record”: we come from the sea.

Tashan also yielded bronze fishhooks and clay net weights — rough evidence that people here fished six millennia ago. But what moved me was the shell imprint. It wasn't utility. It was reverence.

The Salt in the Genes, Written in Water Ripples

The pottery also bears water ripple patterns. Wave after wave carved into wet clay, then fired hard — made permanent. You could call it decoration. I'd rather believe it was a fisherman from six thousand years ago saying to the sea: I remember what you look like.

Later, Xu Fu sailed east from here. The Tang and Song maritime Silk Road docked here. Xiangshan was never an island — it was a node of maritime civilization. But from the very start, that node's character wasn't conquest. It was remembrance.

From Xu Fu's Voyage to the Maritime Silk Road

Legend says Xu Fu led three thousand boys and girls from Penglai Mountain in search of the elixir of immortality. He never found it. But the route remained, later becoming a thread of the maritime Silk Road. Xiangshan people learned early on: the sea isn't a wall, it's a road. But the precondition for walking that road is learning to revere it first.

Shipu: A Fishing Town That's Still Alive

A Ming dynasty poet described Shipu as “beacon fires hanging like moons, fishing boats gathering like stars.” Six hundred years later, you walk the same stone-paved street, and the lanterns are still lit, the dried fish still curing in the wind.

I spent three days in Shipu and never once felt like I was in a “scenic area.” Fishing work songs still ring out — “Ye—lou—ye!” — not performed for tourists but actually used when hauling nets. Fish lanterns are still crafted. The Third Month Third festival is still celebrated. The Guan Gong Blade-Sharpening Festival fills the street with an eight-thousand-person, five-hundred-meter banquet.

Shipu has been a county seat since 706 CE. The Ming dynasty built walls here as a “key fortress of the Zhejiang coast” against pirates. Watchtowers, gun emplacements, and naval garrisons dot the town. Wen Tianxiang wrote “A fairyland of mountains and sea” as he passed these waters — he probably never imagined that six centuries later, people would still be measuring this sea with fishing nets.

In 1935, the film “Song of the Fishermen” was shot here and won honors at the Moscow International Film Festival — China's first internationally awarded film, born in this fishing harbor. Shipu stays alive because fishermen still use it. The old street isn't a tourist zone; it's a living room extended from the dock.

Fishing Work Songs That Pierce Six Millennia

The fishing work song is national-level intangible heritage. No instruments, no written lyrics — passed down entirely by mouth. One person leads, the rest answer, rhythm following the waves. I heard it once at the dock: raw, hoarse, carrying something no recording studio could replicate — the instinctive response of a living person facing a living sea.

Fish Bone Art and Bamboo Root Carving — The Aesthetics of Zero Waste

Heritage artisan Qiu Yasu assembles fish bone paintings using crab claws and yellow croaker bones. Leftover fish bones become a seascape under her hands. Bamboo root carving follows the principle of “70% nature, 30% intention” — let the root dictate the form, don't fight the material. Xiangshan's crafts share a common DNA: use everything, waste nothing. It's the same attitude they bring to the sea.

On Kaiyu Festival Day, Xiangshan Said “Enough” to the Sea

In 1998, Xiangshan did something counterintuitive — they threw a festival for “opening” the fishing season. But what that festival truly celebrated wasn't “finally, we can fish again.” It was “we held back for four and a half months.”

The East China Sea fishing crisis of the 1990s was real. Hairtail thin as ribbons, pomfret small as buttons, four major commercial fish species on the brink. The fishermen knew: keep scraping the bottom, and soon there'd be no fish bones left for art.

In 1995, China implemented the summer fishing moratorium. In 1998, Xiangshan invented the Kaiyu Festival — turning “the end of the moratorium” into a cultural celebration. In 2000, 21 Xiangshan boat captains launched the “Blue Protection” volunteer initiative, demanding longer moratoriums. Then came the nation's first “Beach Chief System” — grid-based management of aquaculture zones, clearing out “extermination nets” that caught everything.

Boat captains demanding to fish less — in another harbor, they'd think you'd lost your mind. But Xiangshan's math is simple: empty the sea, what do you eat next year? The “kai” (open) in Kaiyu Festival carries its real weight in the unspoken “he” (close) — no rest, no opening; no sacrifice, no gain.

Fishermen Come Ashore, Blue Carbon Goes to Sea

Old Le of Gaoni Village remembers his childhood fear — his father coming home late from the sea. Now his son Le Haiyong closes deals by the fish pens, calm even in typhoon season.

Huangbi'ao Township's Gaoni Village is “Zhejiang's top cage-aquaculture village” — thirty years of raising large yellow croaker, annual output around 100 million yuan, average household income over 300,000 yuan. Old Le's generation “begged the sea.” Le Haiyong's generation “partners with the sea” — from taking to collaborating.

The turning point came in 2019. A “three-rights separation” reform cut aquaculture area by 20%, yet fry survival rates rose 15%, and profit per square meter jumped from 200 to 600 yuan. Less space, more money — the same logic as the fishing moratorium: leave the sea room, and it leaves you profit.

China's First Blue Carbon Auction

In February 2023, Xiangshan hammered down China's first blue carbon auction. The “Three Treasures of Xihu” — sea lettuce, kelp, and laver — yielded 2,340.1 tons of carbon sequestration, sold at 106 yuan per ton. Put plainly: the CO2 absorbed by kelp can now earn money. From “living off the sea” to “living with the sea,” Xiangshan took its hardest step: not just restraint, but giving back.

The Price of Bone-Deep Freshness

Xiangshan people have a standard for seafood noodles — “three freshness in one”: fresh ingredients, fresh broth, fresh aroma. What they rarely say aloud: all three depend on the East China Sea resting for four and a half months.

Swimming crabs — Xiangshan was named “China's Hometown of Swimming Crabs” in 2009. Salt-cured raw crab — live crab marinated in brine for 24 hours until the meat turns jelly-like, the highest honor a Xiangshan host can offer. Dried fish — split, salted, wind-cured: literally preserving sea breeze in food.

Seafood noodles are extravagant: crab, yellow croaker, razor clams, clams, smoked fish, mantis shrimp — all in one bowl. Then there's Xiangshan white goose, radish cakes, rice mantou, water tower cakes, Datang wheat cakes — a carbohydrate paradise.

Shipu's seafood stalls have no menus, no price tags. You point at the tank and say “this, this, and this.” Why is Xiangshan's seafood “bone-deep fresh”? Because fish have time to grow, the sea has time to recover, and fishermen have patience to wait. Freshness is the interest earned on restraint.

Salt-Cured Crab — Raw Hospitality

Salt-cured crab is eaten raw. Live swimming crab, cleaned and submerged in brine, refrigerated for 24 hours. The meat sets into jelly — first salt, then sweet, then umami, exploding in sequence on the tongue. Xiangshan people only serve it to their most honored guests. Raw food is the ultimate trust in ingredients — you eat it raw because you trust this sea.

Shipu Stalls — The Trust Economy Without Menus

Shipu stall owners don't write menus. You walk to the seafood tank, point and say “this one, this one, and this one.” The owner nods and starts cooking. Prices are by weight, catch of the day, price of the day. In a city, this might get you a complaint. In Shipu, it's worked for centuries — the logic is simple: fishermen eat the same fish themselves.

What You Might Still Want to Know About Xiangshan

When is the Xiangshan Kaiyu Festival held each year?

September 14–16 annually. The 28th edition launches on September 16, 2025. To watch a thousand sails set out, book a guesthouse in Shipu's old town in advance — the harbor at dawn belongs only to those who stay the night.

How to make the most of Shipu Fishing Port Old Town?

Don't rush the sights. Enter the old town after 4 p.m. (free admission), wait for the lanterns to light up and the fish lantern parade to begin, then eat your way along the harbor stalls. Next morning at five, go to the dock for the first returning boats — that's Shipu's true colors.

Why is Xiangshan's seafood “fresher” than elsewhere?

Three sides surrounded by sea, 988 kilometers of coastline, and the core of three major fishing grounds — that's geography. But the deeper reason: fishing moratoriums give fish time to grow, “protecting the sea through fishing” gives ecology time to recover. Freshness is the interest on restraint.

When's the best time to visit Xiangshan?

September for the Kaiyu Festival and a thousand sails. October–November for the fattest swimming crabs. May for Yu Shan Islands' wildflowers and bioluminescent sea. Skip the summer rush — Songlan Mountain's sea is bluest in autumn.

Epilogue — The Art of Yielding at 30° North

From the Tashan archaeological site to the blue carbon auction floor — six thousand years apart, Xiangshan people traveled only one step: from “demanding from the sea” to “settling accounts with the sea.”

On my last morning in Shipu, I stood at the dock watching boats return. When the first one tied up, a fisherman tossed the smallest few fish back into the water. Nobody told him to. The motion was as natural as breathing.

Xiangshan's most valuable asset isn't the swimming crabs, the yellow croaker, or the 988-kilometer coastline. It's the sense of proportion accumulated over six millennia.

What the sea gives you is never a gift — it's the interest the sea is willing to return after you've shown restraint. Xiangshan took six thousand years to learn that arithmetic. Now, the rest of China might want to sit in on the lesson.

The individuals “Old Le” and “Le Haiyong” are pseudonyms. Aquaculture and economic data are drawn from Xiangshan County government public records and news reports. Qiu Yasu is a real intangible heritage artisan; her craft information has been verified through public reporting.

Zhou Ye — travel and culture columnist. Former journalist, former corporate hand, former entrepreneur, now making a living by writing. He walks China's coastline year-round, tracking maritime civilization and the evolution of fishing villages, writing about “what everyone senses but no one articulates.”