For the purpose of collecting data, the author visitedmany villages in the region south of the Yangtze to makeon-the-spot investigations of hundreds of ancient houseslocated in those villages. The conditions for the existenceand development of these ancient folk houses as well as theircultural connotations have been illustrated in this book. Thefundamental mode of these folk houses is atrium house withChinese curved roof, wooden structure conjugated withtenon and mortise as well as rivets. They present in threetypes: Patio House, Court House and Garden Residence. Theplane figure is presented as Hall Structure symmetricallybuilt along an axis. The external appearances of the housesare harmonious and austere looking, but the internal woodendecorations are refined and complicated.
These ancient folk houses not only function as theresident place, but also embody Chinese moral integrity.,ceremonial system, and agricultural features.
The dialectical relations between human beings, housesand nature have been illustrated in the book. The idea hasbeen presented that harmonious development of man, natureand the state is based on the harmonious relation betweenresidence houses, man, nature, community as well as the state.


Upon inheriting the traditional style of ancient buildings, the curvedroof south of the Yangtze has been simplified according to the practicalcondition and needs. The prominent feature of the roof is its function be-sides the universal spirit inherited from the ancients.
Among the folk houses, the roofings of the ordinary people are builtin straight slopes, but those of the nobles are built in inverted-universeroofs which are formed by adopting the raising-of-truss method. The alti-tude difference of the adjacent ridge-poles is calculated by the length ofthe supporting rack times numbers of the supporting poles. This makes theroof form an "A-shaped' slope for the good drainage and for the immobil-ity of the roof which is securely clasped by the pressure of the roof tiles.Just like the curved palm, the inverted-universe roofs can make the roofobtain the tensile force which equals the inherent stress in reinforced con-crete to strengthen the rigidity of the whole roof truss. This kind of roof isalso good for wind resistance because the wind will glide away along thecurved surface to reduce the pressure.
When the famous Chinese esthetician Professor ZONG Baihua de-scribed the beauty of the colourful collocations and the golden decorationsin his
"Aesthetics Causerie", he took the poems written by the two fa-mous literati XIE Lingyun and YAN Yanzhi of the Southern Song Dy-nasty as examples. He said that XIE' S poems were natural and lovely justlike the budding lotus, and YAN' s poems were noble and elegant just likethe unfolded colourful samite. XIE's poems were like the bathing beau-ties and YAN' s poems were like the elegant colourful samite. They typifythe two esthetic sentiments in the history of aesthetics of China. TheChu-verses of the Warring States Period, the poetic essays of the Hart Dy-nasty, the porcelain wares of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the modemembroideries, and the costumes of Beijing Opera belong to the colourfuland elegant beauty. The bronze wares of the Han Dynasty, the calligraphyof WANG Xizhi, the paintings of GU Kaizhi, the ceramic whitewares ofthe Song Dynasty belong to the lovely and natural beauty.