Games, Music and Entertainment in Tang Communities

Across the Tang empire from 618 to 907, recreation took different forms in imperial courts, the capital Chang’an, and other documented settings. Ball games could entertain the emperor and court, while board play was cultivated by officials and scholars. Music and dance combined skilled performance with court display, and Tang poetry preserves glimpses of musicians and their listeners. These activities were not a single, uniform culture: their surviving accounts particularly illuminate courtly and urban entertainment.

Cuju ball games, weiqi, and musical performance all depended on practiced skills, but they brought people together in different ways. Some were organized as contests, others as court entertainment or individual performance. The evidence includes descriptions in historical writing and poetry as well as objects and images made for elite burials.

On this page4 sections

Cuju in fields, mansions, and palaces

Cuju , literally a game of kicking a ball, was played in Tang settings with a ball that had changed from an earlier feather-stuffed form to one filled with air and covered by a two-layer casing. Descriptions identify two goal arrangements: a net stretched between posts, and a single goal set in the middle of the field.

In Chang’an, cuju fields stood in the grounds of palaces and in the courtyards of large mansions. Soldiers from the imperial army and the Gold Bird Guard formed teams to entertain the emperor and his court. The game also attracted scholars and officials: a courtier who was not a skilled player could take the role of scorekeeper. Accounts also note the development of women’s teams, though they provide little detail about who played in them or how often. Cuju thus brought together athletic skill, organized competition, and spectatorship in settings ranging from elite urban households to the palace.

Weiqi as a game of judgment and strategy

Weiqi, known in English as Go, was played with black and white stones on a gridded board. The 19-by-19 grid was established by the Tang period. Players placed stones on the board’s intersections, aiming to surround areas and restrict the opponent’s positions. Chinese games commonly began with some stones already set on the board, rather than with the empty board familiar from many modern games.

Weiqi had a strong place in elite and courtly life. Tang emperors supported skilled players, and the court maintained ranks for players as well as an office known as the Go Attendant, whose holder played with the emperor. Some rulers regarded skill at the game as relevant to political judgment and the cultivation of Confucian virtues. These associations made weiqi more than a pastime for its elite practitioners: it could also serve as a demonstration of patience, planning, and disciplined decision-making.

Pipa music and court performance

The pipa, a plucked lute, was a prominent instrument in Tang court music. Tang forms included four- and five-string instruments, including pear-shaped lutes. Players used a large plectrum to strike and pluck the strings. The instrument could be heard alone or as part of an ensemble, including performances of daqu, elaborate music-and-dance suites.

The player held the lute across the body and used the plectrum near its sounding surface. Fingers of the other hand pressed strings against the neck to change pitch. Faster or slower plucking, repeated notes and changes in force created contrasting effects, while the hollow body amplified the vibrating strings.

Pipa music also reflected connections across the empire’s trade and cultural networks. Related instruments and playing traditions came from Central Asia, and performers and teachers from Kucha and Persia were in demand in Chang’an. The court was an important audience, but the instrument’s place in Tang poetry suggests that performance could also be encountered beyond formal palace entertainment.

Dance, poetry, and audiences

Tang poetry offers a vivid, though literary, account of listening to music. In “Song of the Pipa,” the poet Bai Juyi describes an encounter with a female pipa player on the Yangtze River. He compares the instrument’s sounds to heavy rain, quiet speech, and pearls falling onto a jade dish.

Images and objects add another kind of evidence. Tang tomb figurines include dancing women and groups of female musicians on horseback. Such figures were made for elite burials, particularly near the capital in the late seventh and eighth centuries.

The court also maintained the Pear Garden troupe under Emperor Xuanzong (712–756), a court ensemble for trained music and performance. Its performances served the emperor’s pleasure.

For the wider setting, see Work, Festivals and Entertainment in Tang Communities: Everyday Life, 618–907.