Xiayang is located in present-day Haicang Region, Fujian Province. Xiayang Village used to belong to Haicheng County, Zhangzhou Prefecture during the Ming and Qing Dynasties. At the end of the Yuan Dynasty, Yeo Teik Kheng moved with his parents from Henan to southern Fujian (Minnan). One early morning he found himself in a new place and caught the beautiful sunrise scene on the beach. Seeing the glow from the rising sun while embracing the sea, he made an important decision. He moved his family to the village which he named Xiayang, rhyming in Hokkien (Minnan language) ‘taking to the sea‘, but literally meaning ‘glowing sun‘, and continued the Yeo lineage from there. The Yeo decendants of Xiayang have since travelled to seas of South China for many hundreds of years, mostly doing trades, and left their footprints all over many Southeast Asian countries. Several generations of settlements in foreign lands later, Xiayang Yeo’s Gongsi (clan associations) were formed. In 1834, Penang Sit Teik Tong was established; in 1854, Rangoon (Yangon) Sit Teik Tong was established. Sit Teik, means ‘planting seeds of virtue’.

Xiayang, together with XinAn,  was one of the common ancestral villages of many overseas Chinese that settled in south-east-asia before the 20th century.  In the early decades, they were better known as the Haicheng Ren (people).

After China became a Republic, Zhangzhou Prefecture was abolished in 1913.  Thereafter, Fujian experienced several decades of political instability. Towns and villages in Haicheng were grouped and regrouped to be put under different regional administrations.  At present, Xiayang forms a part of Haicang Region that comes under the government of Xiamen Municipal District.

Here is a map showing where Xiayang is located in the Xiamen Municipal District.

The following map shows the approximate territorial coverage of the obsolete Haicheng county.