Yan Tun Kong Study Hall, also known as Yin Yik Tong, is the most important building of the Tang clan in Hang Tau Tsuen, Ping Shan. The year of construction is uncertain. According to the indigenous villagers, it was built by the Tang clan to commemorate their 14th to 16th generation ancestors Tang Wai-tak (alias Yan-shaw), Tang Ji-fong (alias Tun-fuk) and Tang Fung (alias Ming-kong). The engraved characters “re-carved in the 9th year of Tongzhi reign (1870)” on the wooden plaque hanging in the main hall suggest that the study hall underwent large-scale renovations that year.
The study hall was built to educate clan youngsters in preparation for the Imperial Civil Service Examinations. The side rooms in the study hall were provided as accommodation for scholars. When the Imperial Civil Service Examination was abolished, the study hall was converted into a venue for modern education for village children. Its function as a study hall gradually faded with the founding of Tat Tak School in Ping Shan in the 1930s.
Apart from teaching purposes, Yan Tun Kong Study Hall serves as an ancestral hall of the Tang clan. Soul tablets commemorating ancestors of the Tang clan in Hang Tau Tsuen are worshipped at the main altar in the main hall. Nowadays, the Tang descendants still gather in the study hall to hold traditional clan festivals and other activities, such as ancestor worship in the Spring and Autumn Equinoxes.
Yan Tun Kong Study Hall was originally a two-hall building with an open courtyard between the halls. The two-storey annex in the rear was added in the 1950s. Several exquisite architectural features are preserved in the study hall, such as the finely carved ancestral altar, tuofeng (camel’s humps), fascia boards and couplets. The roof ridges and facade are decorated with elaborate plaster mouldings with auspicious motifs.
Yan Tun Kong Study Hall was declared a monument in 2009.