The typical timber ancestral halls in Canton in Lingnan area were investigated in this paper.In order to explore the mechanical properties of the hoop head tenon joints of the timber ancestral hall,one scaled model of Merbau timber frame was tested under the vertical static load while one scaled model of timber frame was tested un- der the low-cycle reversed loading.By the former test,the behaviors of the hoop head tenon joints,such as the failure mode,the mechanical characteristics and the stiffness characteristic,were obtained.By the latter test,the behaviors of the hoop head tenon joints,such as the failure mode,the hysteretic curves,the skeleton curves,the ductility,the stiffness degradation and the energy dissipation,were gained.Experimental results show that the specimen under the vertical static load fails because the bottom wood fiber of the beam breaks,while the specimen under the low low-cycleic reversed loading fails because of the splitting failure of the lateral of the beam end.In addition,under the low low-cycleic reversed loading,the hoop head tenon joints show a semi-rigid characteristic with a plump hysteretic curve,a concave and convergent stiffness curve,and a large equivalent viscous damping coefficient,which means that the specimen has a good seismic behavior.