Love Locks (Heart Link Locks) on Huangshan, aka Yellow Mountain - what’s the story?
When couples snap their ‘Love Locks’ onto the rails and chains at Yellow Mountain and throw the key into the mountain valley below so that their decision to be together becomes irreversible. Once locked, their lock will remain locked. In spirit, they are taking the same plunge that the two lovers did that fateful night.
Huangshan, or as it’s known to the English-speaking world: Yellow Mountain.
Nowadays, smitten couples climb in droves to snap a lock onto the safety rails and throw the key down into the gulley below. Heart-shaped locks engraved with the couple’s names makes it obvious – it’s an act of commitment. Sounds nice, right?
But there’s a truly beautiful idea behind this custom - and it goes deep.
Where did this strange behaviour begin? Legend has it, it all started with a tragic tale of forbidden love.
The Yellow Mountain legend of the ‘Heart Lock Lovers’ and Tiandu Peak – Part 1.
Long ago a comely young maiden and honest young man met and fell in love in the town below Huangshan.
The father of the girl – a wealthy merchant - opposed their love. The young man was not wealthy, and he would not allow his daughter to endure a life of struggling and hardship, regardless of the the couple’s deep feelings for one another. Thus, the father made arrangements for his daughter to wed with the prince of a wealthy family of the Chinese court. Her father closed her away, where she was to remain until the day of the wedding.
The date of the forced marriage drawing closer and closer, he could no longer restrain himself.
On the eve of the wedding, the young man stormed the merchant’s home to rescue his love. From the house they fled into the trails of the nearby Yellow Mountain.
Legs and lungs burning, they scratched and clambered upwards away from the shouts and footsteps of her father’s men close behind. The trail dirt under foot became smooth, grey stone. Up they raced. They pressed their bodies against the steep rock as their hands felt for support. The voices behind them grew louder – clearer – closer. Higher and higher they climbed. Hearts pounding fast and ragged, they pulled their weary bodies up onto the flat rock crown of Tiandu Peak. Their legs couldn’t carry them any further, and there was nowhere left to run.
They both knew that to be caught would mean to never feel the other’s warmth; to never see or hear one-another’s smile or voice again. For a long moment they sat in the moonlight with sad, loving eyes locked together, searching for an answer... and their answer came.
The couple rose to their feet.
Arm in arm, they stepped out, off of their moonlight platform.
Together, they disappeared into the valley below Tiandu Peak.
The Yellow Mountain legend of the ‘Heart Lock Lovers’ and Tiandu Peak – Part 2.
Arriving upon Tiandu Peak to find the lovers had vanished, the men feared the worst. They returned to the young maiden’s father to report what had happened. The bereaved father mourned. Funeral arrangements were made, but one thing was still missing.
For days, search parties scoured the Huangshan valleys below Tiandu in search of the couple’s remains. They searched and searched for days and days, but in the end all that was found was a small, stone lock.
Even stranger still - on the lock were two names – the names of the lovers.
Word of this spread far and wide.
So… what happened to the Heart Lock Lovers?
There’s a god in Chinese mythology, known by the vague name of the ‘Old Man in the Moonlight’, or “YueLao” for short. He is the mythological figure responsible for the marriage and fated love.
In the legend, the two lovers were faced with a choice.
Exhausted, with nowhere left to run, they had two options: One - to be captured and separated to live a life of sorrow apart;
OR, Two - to make a final decision to be together, no matter what… even if that meant their death.
The maiden in the story was to be wed against her will at the whim of her father. In other words, her fate was out of her hands.
The lovers then flee from that fate to the mountain, the girl’s father’s men chasing them all the way. The lovers are defying the fate others had made for them, but it won’t let them go so easily.
Finally, with nowhere left to run, they make a decision that can’t be taken back – they leap from the moonlight, into the black. At this point they transcend the fate others have set for them. The lovers' act moved the heavens, rewriting their fate.
As the events of that night unfolded, YueLao watched.
As the lovers stepped from the Tiandu Peak cliff edge into the abyss, they abandoned everything but each-other. Witnessing this, YueLao bound them as one. They disappeared from this world leaving nothing but a token of their mutual devotion - a stone lock.
From the next life unto eternity, they would be fated lovers.
Thus, Chinese legend has it that, through acts of absolute devotion, lovers are capable of moving the heavens, swaying the heart of YueLao and rewriting their fate. Love breaks all boundaries.
What does it mean to put a lock on the chain at Tiandu Peak?
It was on Huangshan’s Tiandu Peak that the lovers cast their bodies into the valley. Their decision was absolute and irreversible, and for this reason, their love swayed YueLao into intertwining their fates as lovers for eternity.
Today, couples aren’t lining up to jump off cliffs together – after all, for the most part they aren’t being chased onto a mountain cliff by the bride’s father’s goons.
So instead, these couples snap their ‘Love Locks’ onto the rails and chains at Yellow Mountain and throw the key into the mountain valley below so that their decision becomes irreversible. Once locked, their lock will remain locked. In spirit, they are taking the same plunge that the two lovers did that fateful night.
The red ribbons on the locks – especially on Mt. Hua in Shaan’xi Province.
You may have noticed that certain locks are tied with red ribbons. This is another allusion to the mythology surrounding China’s god of matrimony and fated love – YueLao.
You may have heard that in some cultures a ‘red string’ is said to connect fated lovers to one-another. The idea is basically that it is this invisible red string that will eventually lead them to one another. In Chinese culture, YueLao is the one who does the tying – connecting fated lovers. For this reason, he’s known as ‘the Matchmaker’ – the one who knows the fates of our love and arranges our meeting.
When couples (Chinese or otherwise) tie their locks with red ribbons, as I understand it, they are hanging up the string of fate that lead them to each-other. Why? Because it has served its purpose – the two have found each-other and made their connection. The red ribbons represent this string.
Why put the Love Locks on mountain chains and not just anywhere else?
In cultures around the world mountains are considered holy places. Why? Because they are places where the earth meets the sky.
When the Heart Lock lovers on made that irreversible decision together on Yellow Mountain, they did it on the mountain’s highest peaks – in other words, they did it where the earth and heavens meet. Here they can be seen by the heavens, by the god of love, which in China is YueLao.
Likewise, when couples wish to make a pact or commitment that they want both the earth and heavens to see, they make it here – on the mountain peaks. This is why Huangshan’s Tiandu peak’s guard rails and chains are covered in locks.
Some other hidden meanings in the Heart Lock Lovers story that connect to Chinese culture.
The story, like all myths, captures some symbols and things from the culture it came from. Here are some that I noticed.
1. The moonlight on Tiandu peak
In the legend (at least in this version of the legend), the lovers flee to Yellow Mountain and eventually come to a dead end in the moonlight on top of Tiandu Peak. This tells us a couple of things:
YueLao is watching!
YueLao is China’s god of matrimony and fated love. The name “YueLao” is actually a shortening of “Yue Xia Lao Ren” – which is more of a description than a name, translating to ‘Old Man in the Moonlight’. Here we can see a clear connection between this god and moonlight.
In the story the lovers pull themselves up into the moonlight on Tiandu peak. So, why is the moonlight important? The answer: it tells us that the lovers have got YueLao’s attention. The light is shining on them isn’t just any old moonlight – it’s YueLao’s light!
Also, it’s important to note that in Chinese culture a full moon is a symbol of togetherness and completeness. The story doesn’t tell us if the moon is full or not, but we can assume that chances are, it is.
2. The word for “lock” in Mandarin Chinese
Chinese has lots of homophones – words that sound identical or almost identical, but have different meanings. The Mandarin Chinese word for the verb “Lock” is one such word.
To lock (the action) a lock (the thing). Here, we are going to talk about the former: the action ‘to lock’.
In Mandarin Chinese, the word for ‘to lock’ is pronounced /dìng/, but this same pronunciation has lots other meanings, and as you will see, they are clearly connected to the story of the Heart Lock Lovers. /dìng/ is also in the word for “decide” or “make a decision”(决定). /dìng/ is also used in the word for “engaged to be married”, aka “betrothed”(订婚). It also appears in a word for “destiny (定分)”.
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