经济学人466:平遥古城 票号的幽灵

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　　平遥古城

　　In banking¹'s shadow

　　票号的幽灵

　　A former financial hub now begs for the patronage² of tourists

　　曾经的金融中心，如今向光顾的游客乞食

　　The town Mao forgot

　　免遭太祖毒手的小城

　　ITALIAN cities such as Florence and Venice have long made a mint from the architectural wonders built when they were financial centres. China has been slower to capitalise on the physical remains³ of past commercial glory in Pingyao, an urban backwater in inland Shanxi province, which was China's banking hub in the 19th century. Today tourists flock to the walled city, with its unusually well-preserved houses built between the 17th and 19th centuries. But restoring its former wealth remains elusive⁴.

　　像佛罗伦萨、威尼斯这类曾经是金融中心的意大利城市留有大量辉煌的建筑，人们也早就开始利用这些遗迹赚钱。中国的平遥是位于内地省份山西的闭塞小城，19世纪时曾是全国的金融中心，平遥往日商业辉煌的遗迹之前也开发得相对慢。如今这座城墙高耸，拥有大片保存良好的明清建筑的小城迎来了熙熙攘攘的游客。但要重现往日的富裕，仍是不太可能的。

　　平遥古城.jpg

　　The most-visited attraction in modern Pingyao is the Rishengchang Draft Bank, which in 1823 became the first in China to issue cheques. The city lay on the path of a lucrative⁵ trade route. The bank's manager spied a business opportunity when he saw silver shipments passing each other in opposite direction. He replaced pricey security, wagons⁶ and pack animals with a clearing house.

　　日昇昌票号是如今平遥最吸引人的景点，1823年，这家票号开出了中国第一张支票。平遥小城坐落在财源滚滚的贸易路线上。票号经理从来来往往运送白银的商队中觉察到了商机。他以这样一间提供结算服务的铺子，取代了代价不菲的镖师，马车，牲畜。

　　The bank spawned⁷ around 50 competitors across Shanxi (nearly half in Pingyao) with hundreds of branches across the empire. At the time Chinese bankers were held in lower esteem⁸ than peasants and tradesmen. They tried to keep staff honest by making them pledge their homes and even to surrender their families as slaves if they committed fraud; investors⁹ had no control over the banks' daily operations.

　　在日昇昌的刺激下，山西省内诞生了约50家类似的票号（半数都在平遥），数以百计的分庄遍布整个帝国。在那时的中国，票号掌柜的地位比农民商人都低。为了确保伙计的诚信，掌柜会让伙计当掉自己的房子，一旦发现有欺诈行为，会把伙计们的家人卖作佣人；同时票号的出资人无权掌控日常的经营。

　　But it was not the staff that did for the banks. They collapsed¹⁰ soon after the Qing dynasty's demise¹¹ in 1911. The government withdrew its remittance¹² business, currency unification removed the need for the silver trade between cities and competition grew from modern banks.

　　但最终不是伙计们毁了票号。1911年清朝灭亡后，票号很快便都倒闭了。政府取缔了票号的汇款业务，白银流通因统一的纸币而失去需求，来自现代化银行的竞争日益激烈。

　　Pingyao's ensuing poverty proved to be its saviour¹³. Its picturesque¹⁴ grid¹⁵ of traditional imperial houses survived when most elsewhere succumbed¹⁶ to Mao's hatred¹⁷ of the old and his successors' love of the new. Now it has reinvented itself. Around 1.5m people visited Pingyao in 2013, up from around 50,000 in 1997 when UNESCO named it a world heritage site.

　　而后的穷困反倒拯救了这座小城。当全国上下都屈服于太祖对旧物的憎恨，以及后继者们对新物的狂热的之时，平遥安然躲过了这一切，风景如画，星罗棋盘的旧帝国式建筑群也得以保存。如今平遥又重拾自我。2013年共有约150万人来到平遥，当1997年联合国教科文组织认定其为世界文化遗产时，这个数字只有五万。

　　Hope that the streets would again be lined with silver are overblown. The benefits of the tourist boom are spread only narrowly. A small, spruced-up central area thrums with visitors enjoying the curved rooftops, traditional fa?ades, red lanterns and, strangely, Mao memorabilia. Beyond the centre, many streets look like slums: roofs slump¹⁸, walls are crumbling¹⁹ and waste is carried away by a horse rather than sewers²⁰. Few can afford to fix up their homes, even with financial support from the government and the California-based Global Heritage Fund, a charity that is helping²¹ to preserve some of China's historical sites.

　　期盼平遥的街巷又一次镶金带银，是过于乐观了。旅游繁荣只是让小范围收益。小小的，打扮整齐的中央区中游客来往，欣赏着建筑的坡顶，古朴的外观，红灯笼，以及一些诡异的太祖纪念品。中央区之外，许多街道看着像贫民窟：屋顶塌陷，墙体摇摇欲坠，污秽甚至不是排进下水道，而是由马匹运出。尽管政府有财政支持，意在保护中国某些历史遗迹，总部位于加利福尼亚的全球文化遗产基金会也有捐助，但也几乎没人有钱来修缮一下自己的家。

　　To declutter the town, four-fifths of the city's population have been moved outside the city walls since 1997. But the new town's hotels and karaoke halls are often empty. A high-speed rail link that opened in July running from the nearby provincial²² capital, Taiyuan, to Xi'an (home of the crowd-pulling Terracotta Army) should draw the crowds. But ease of access also means ease of retreat: most sightseers come only for the day. Making money from moving people around China may prove harder than profiting from the movement of silver.

　　为整理市容，自1997年起，平遥城五分之四的人口已迁出城外。不过在面貌一新的古城，旅馆与KTV却经常空空如也。七月开通了从省会太原到西安（兵马俑所在地）的高铁，会为平遥古城带来游客。但人方便过来，也方便出去：观光客们一般就在城里逗留一个白天。从人来人往中赚钱，的确比运输白银更为艰难啊。

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