Liúyáng

Liuyang lies in eastern Hunan, near the mountains that separate it from Jiangxi. It is known for the making of firecrackers, a craft whose practitioners honour Li Tian as their ancestral master. Local accounts preserve different traditions about his life, but the sound of exploding firecrackers became a familiar part of celebrations in the county.

A Qing gazetteer from the Kangxi reign describes paper tubes filled with powder, given as gifts and set off in noisy contests before the New Year. The craft grew in the eighteenth century. Liuyang also maintained a Confucian temple, moved to the western corner of the county town in 1505 and relocated again in 1818 after successive repairs.