“World Heritage in China Series No. 8: Zuojiang Huashan Rock Art Cultural Landscape” Special Stamps

In 1985, China became a state party of the Convention for the Protection of World Cultural and Natural Heritage. To date, more than 50 cultural and natural heritage sites have been inscribed on the World Heritage List by the World Heritage Committee of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).  Since 2012, Hongkong Post has issued stamp sheetlets Nos. 1 to 7 under the World Heritage in China Series. The current issue, Zuojiang Huashan Rock Art Cultural Landscape, is the eighth in the series.

Situated in Chongzuo City in the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, the Zuojiang Huashan Rock Art Cultural Landscape was listed as a world heritage site in 2016.  Illustrated with paintings, the steep cliffs along the Zuojiang River and its tributary the Mingjiang River are named “Huashan” by the locals and also known as “pay laiz” in the Zhuang language, meaning “mountain with painting”. 

The painted areas on the cliffs along the river courses stretch over a hundred kilometres, totalling more than 100 sites with around 4 000 images. The landscape areas with the cliffs bearing the rock art cover more than 6 600 hectares in total. It is regarded as the most extensive site of a rock art cluster in southern China as well as Southeast Asia in terms of the number and density of the ochre pictographs. Renowned as “a divine book without words” and “treasure of the Zhuang culture”, these pictographs were created by the ancient Luoyue people, the ancestors of the Zhuang ethnic group more than 2 000 years ago, in the era between the Warring States period and the Eastern Han Dynasty. Squatting figures and motifs of the ritual ceremonies in the rock paintings illustrate the mystique of primitive religious beliefs as well as the social and spiritual life of the time. The images of drums portrayed in the pictographs are also believed to have a close connection with the bronze drum heritage in the region.

The Chongzuo City’s Ningming Huashan rock art, featured in the background of the stamp sheetlet, is the largest and most inclusive site in the entire Zuojiang Huashan rock art cluster, containing the most densely placed and comprehensive pictographs. With a coverage of more than 8 000 square metres, it is also the largest single rock painting of its kind on earth. The stamp affixed in the stamp sheetlet showcases the ritual dance in this piece of rock art.

Acknowledgement: Department of Publicity, CPC Chongzuo Municipal Committee, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region

Official First Day Covers at $1.30 each will be put on sale at all post offices from 30 July 2019. The stamp sheetlet and associated philatelic products will be displayed at the General Post Office, Tsim Sha Tsui Post Office, Tsuen Wan Post Office, Sha Tin Central Post Office and Tuen Mun Central Post Office from the same day. Advance orders for servicing self-provided covers will be accepted at all philatelic offices from 30 July 2019 to 5 August 2019.

Stamp products include Stamp Sheetlet and presentation pack. Serviced first day cover is also available at the philatelic offices on the issue day only.

Sales Arrangement

• A hand-back date-stamping service using the office steel date-stamp and the special postmark will be provided on 13 August 2019 at all post offices for official/privately-made covers bearing the first day of issue indication and a local address. All philatelic offices will also provide hand-back date-stamping service using the “Philatelic Bureau” pictorial postmark and the philatelic office pictorial postmark concurrently. The GPO-1 date-stamp will only be available at General Post Office.

• All stamp products will be available starting from 13 August 2019 for three months while stock lasts.

• All stamp products will be available at Hongkong Post Internet Shopping Mall – “ShopThruPost” (website: shopthrupost.hongkongpost.hk) starting from 13 August 2019 at 8 a.m., while stock lasts.