Commerce Hinterland of Ancient Lukang   

　　Due to its superior geographical condition, Lukang's commercial area is broad ranging from the Dongluo creek (the branch of Jhuoshuei creek) in the south, Dadu creek in the north to the Bagua hill in the east. Due to the regular lack of food along the south east coastal line in China, Lukang, which dominated the geographical hinge, naturally became a transfer stop for rice and other food and it had been the largest harbor in central Taiwan since Cian-Long period. The merchant ships coming to Taiwan from mainland China imported various groceries such as cloth, tobacco, wood, etc. The commercial benefit was very large and all kinds of products were sold on the Wu-Fu Street. The well-known “Lukang 8 Jiao” is the organization that controls all these business behaviors.  Among them, the Cyuan-Jiao was the largest one.  Judging by the club house Cyuan-Jiao had built, we can still imagin how prosperous Lukang's commerce used to be.

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        The so called “Jiao” refers to the civil organizations composed of city exporters or wholesalers making sure effective commercial behaviors in every commercial harbor along the Taiwan coastline in Cing dynasty. This kind of organization is similar to European guilds during medieval period. The organizations are started by merchants, organizing same type of stores and offering same regulations for all members to follow. Taiwanese Jiao differs from European guild in that Jiao has same religion and worships the same gods. At that time, the religious situation was very complicated in Lukang and people worshipped various gods. We won't discuss this here, but what's worth noticing is that in the “no sky” market area, only Jiaotou Temple without any major gods. This is very different from other developed area in Lukang.

        Lugang differed from other commercial harbors in that compared with other cities, Lukang had a lot more commercial organizations. At that time, Lukang had eight organizations while Dan-Shuei had only one. This might be due to the prosperity of the commerce in Lukang. They resemble nowadays’ commercial guild. Lukang had already had 8 Jiaos before 1816. The names, business type and number of stores of the 8 Jiaos are listed as Figure 1.

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《The diagram is adapted from the homepage of Lukang Township Office》

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Story of Eight Jiao

     These eight commercial organizations had lots of funds coming from members’ contribution or regular fee enacted in the regulations of the organization. What can be certain is that the 8 Jiaos had very powerful influence over commerce and they were even more powerful than the government at that time. The remain of the garden, Jinyiyuan, that Cyuan-Jiao built were still located in the southern Lukang, and it was said the memebers of Cyuan Jiao helped those who were unable to earn a living in this garden. They even had once stopped a riot. This could show how mighty they were. The organization is often managed by master of Jiao (usually master of Lu, and had to take turns every year) and the members of Jiao are called Jiaoyuan. They are responsible for setting regulations to maintain the goodwill, hold a fiesta in honor of a deity, and conciliate quarrels between members. Jiao's power was so big that sometime its conciliation was more influential than the government's.

     Due to the 8 Jiao's power, the “No sky" street area remained competitive in commerce a hundred years after the harbor silted up. With the intrusion of foreign power, the efforts of 8 Jiaos against foreign companies, however, made Lukang lost its competitive superiority and declined drastically. Then residents moved out and led to the disappearance of the “No sky" street area. Ironically, those Lukang residents who lost their jobs due to the decline of commerce turned to do folk handicrafts and led to the highly-valued folk handicraft skills in Lukang nowadays.

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