After Longmen Rock Cave in luoyang city and Yinxu in Anyang city of Henan province were applied for the World Cultural Heritage successfully, the Government of Zhengzhou City are applying Shaolin Ancient Architectures for the World Cultural Heritagefor again.
There are several members of the World Cultural Heritage and some other high level experts from abroad and home get together in Zhenzhou recently. The official of Zhenzhou has got ready everything to accept the checkup. All kinds of datum has been gotten ready. They are trying hard to win this time again. In a world, the people of Henan is doing a perfect thing and hoping to get a very nice result.
Shaoli Temple is well known both at home and abroad. Especially Kongfu is very famous in the world. But few people know about the Group Shaolin Ancient Architectures. In order to let more people in the world know and share these Chinese center ancient treasure architectures, The People of Henan province is working hard for it.
Soon we hope the Group of Shaolin Ancient Architectures will be known more in the world. And each people of Henan province will be very proud of introducing and sharing the unique scenic spots to the guests coming from all over the world.
For the sake of knowing better of the Group of Shaolin Ancient Architectures, some introductionare following.
Shaolin Temple
Shaolin temple is quite famous all over the world.
Shaolin Temple lies at the foot of Songshan Mountain. It is about 80 kilometres to the Southwest of Zhengzhou City. In the year of 495 A.D, Emperor Xiaowen of the Northern Song Dynasty had it built for an Indian monk to spread Buddhism in China. In the year of 527 A.D, Buddhi-Dharma came to this area and founded Zen Sect of Buddhism. Since then, Shaolin Temple became influential. Especially in Tang Dynasty, Shaolin Temple was entitled ‘the NO.1 Temple in China’ by Emperor Taizong, because he was once rescued by 13 martial monks from Shaolin Temple.
Today, this old temple is quite famous for 2 reasons. First, it is the origin of Zen Sect Buddhism. Zen Sect is an important branch of Buddhism, which has many disciples in Asia. It combined the thoughts of Confucianism and other Chinese local religions. Second, Shaolin Temple is the cradle of Chinese martial arts, which is called kung Fu or ‘wu shu’ in Chinese. China is the hometown of Kung Fu, while Shaolin Temple is the cradle of Chinese Kung Fu.
The area of Shaolin Temple is about 30,000 square meters. There are 7 high buildings on the central line. Upon the gate of Shaolin Temple, we can see 3 Chinese characters. That is the Chinese name of this temple. The name was written by the most popular Emperor of Qing Dynasty---
Kangxi. The grand hall is the centre of the whole yard. It is the place where Buddhist Monks have their daily lessons and hold big ceremonies. The last hall in the yard would be very interesting, because people can find 48 deep depressions on the floor of this hall. These depressions were made by groups of martial monks when they practised Kung Fu in this hall. From this scene we can tell it is very hard to become a Kong Fu master.
About 400 meters to the west of Shaolin Temple, there is a big group of pagodas called ‘Pagoda Forest’. Under these pagodas of different types are tombs of famous monks from Shaolin Temple. Altogether, there are more than 240 pagodas in this yard and it is the largest pagoda group now existing in China.
Of course, there are still many other attractive spots in Shaolin scenic area。 But Shaolin Temple is one of the most unique and mysterious temple in China. Here are full of precious heritage that our ancestors left.
Songyue Temple Pagoda
Songyue Temple Pagoda lies in the Songyue Temple Pagoda at the foot of south Songshan Mountain, north 5 kilometres to Dengfeng town. It was a world fairyland with encircled mountains, settingt off one another mountain forest and singing birds.
Songyue Temple Pagoda was early built in Yongping year,Beiwei Dynasty ( 508-511A.D.). It was the original temporary palace of Emperor Xuanwu. The name was changed to Xianju Temple Pagoda in Zhenguangyuan year (520 A.D.) There are more than 700 monks and thousands magnificence fanes. It was named Songyue Temple in the first year of Suireng (601 A.D.). Than they built Qifo Buddha Hall,Wuliang Buddha Hall, Dingguang Buddha Hall.in Tang Dynasty. They looks really very majestic and Splend.The Emperor Tang gaozong and Empress Wu zetian used here to Xanadu when they traveled here. Currently the Songyue Temple was only a part of the original one. And now there are more other buildings except Songyue Temple Pagoda, such as,Daxiong Hall, Jialan Hall and Liuzu Hall etc..
Songyue Temple Pagoda was built in Zengguang year of Beiwei (520- 525A.D.) which was commemorated the ancestor Sakyamuni. It is the first pagoda in the history in Songshan region. Songyue Temple Pagoda was built by green bricks fifteen floor brick pagoda. The figure shows at 12 sides in plane. It was formed by groundwork and the main pagoda with 36.788m high. The figure looks like parabola from outside. It shows quite excellent.
Architecture in Songyue Temple Pagoda incarnates the Buddhist cultural spread and evolvement in China. The upside of the pagoda is a shape of parabola figure. The downside of the pylon adopted the decoration of blaze shape gate and pot-gate leonine shape. That’s a witness of the amalgamation Buddhist architecture cultural between India and China. Songyue Temple Pagoda has gone through the wind affection for more than 1480 years. But it’s still standing erect toweringly there. It not only achieves a quite high artistic level but also incarnate lofty technic of building pagoda. That’s a splendor nonesuch among Chinese architecture history. The advanced structure of the pagoda, cylindrical style structure flourishes in the world. It was called the earliest architecture of cylindrical style in the world. It was an example which studying the room layout of early China about the system building temple rooms around the center pagpda. No one pagoda can substitute its status in its pure combine both of inimitable design and the nature entironment.
Fawang Temple Scenic Spot
Surrounded with mountain forests and peaks,Fawang Temple Scenic Spot is one of the most attractive spots at Mt Songshan.It has Fawang Temple,one of the earliest Buddhist temples,built in the 14th year of Yongping of the Eastern Han Dynasty (AD71),Songyue Temple Pagoda,the earliest Buddhist pagoda,built in the Northern Wei Dynasty,under state-level protection,and Master Jingzang’s Pagoda,the earliest octagonal pagoda current preserved in China.In the western part there is Huishan Temple with beautiful surroundings where Master Yixing,a monk and astronomer of the Tang Dynasty and world celebrity practiced Buddhism.