兌悅門｜Duiyuemen

Long gone is the Great West Gate from Tainan. The Small West Gate still exists in Tainan, but it has been relocated to the NCKU campus in the east of the city. Still, the western part of Tainan does have a gate that remains in its original location. Duiyuemen was not part of the main city walls. It is a small gate that was built into outlying walls that served the expansion of the city to the west. This gate is named duì after the western direction in the eight trigrams, a key diagram in Taoist cosmology. There were two other gates in this series of western walls, but they were torn down with the rest of the gates and walls over the years. In its time, the gate was meant to strengthen city defenses. Now it is simply part of a neighborhood and a reminder of the walls that once protected the city. more...

兌悅門是昔日臺灣府城從小西門延伸到小北門之外城的三座城門之中唯一僅存者，因位於正西方而以八卦中的「兌」為名，城門橫額提有兌悅門，兌者八卦方位之西方，已應此門為往西。兌悅門今為國定古蹟，位於臺南市中西區，昔日是五條港的新港墘港所在的地方。這座城門也是現今臺南市所有城門中唯一還具有通行功能的城門。臺南市另外現存三座城門都已不位於道路之上，小西門的奠坤門/小北門拱乾門，三個城門共築一道堅實的外城，由小西門外繞至小北門主要抵抗海盜的騷擾。兌悅門又稱為咾咕石城或甕城。
兌悅門的臺座應是用咾咕石為材料，上面再砌上紅磚、用白灰粉刷，內部則用夯土而成，而在牆角處則有用花崗岩來補強。城門的西立面比東立面略高，而且在西立面這邊還設置有垛牆鎗口（東立面無鎗口）。原本城門有設置門板，但已不知何時遺失。更多...