From the south end of the West Causeway to the east is the Xiuyi Bridge, and across the bridge is the East Causeway. There are still some landscapes to the west from the south end of the West Causeway. The east of it is Kunming Lake, and the west is called Kunming West Lake. Going west along the south bank of Kunming West Lake, the lake gradually turns north. This area of water is planted with a lot of lotus every year. In summer, this is the famous lotus pond in the Summer Palace. There are cruise ships that pull tourists in to enjoy the lotus, and of course they are also admired by the lotus. My two lotus pictures from the last episode were taken here. Looking over the lake by boat, you can see an island completely covered by green trees.
There is a long embankment on the west side of the island, connecting the west bank of the West Lake. You can go to the island along this embankment.
There is a fence gate guarded by soldiers on the island, and visitors are not allowed to enter. During Qingyiyuan period, there was a Zao Jiantang here, so the island is called Zao Jiantang Island. After Zaojiantang was burned down by the British and French allied forces in the tenth year of Xianfeng (1860 AD), it was rebuilt in the Guangxu period. It is said that it is decorated in a European style, which is the style of those arsonists. I don't know why.
Zao is rhetoric, and Jian is identification. During the Qianlong Dynasty, after the palace examination of each subject, the examination papers were transported here for review. Then "Zao Jian" means selecting materials based on literature. Zaojian Hall and the West Palace Gate not far from here are the first batch of buildings in Qingyi Garden, which were completed in the 19th year of Qianlong (AD 1754). In the Qing Dynasty, the imperial examination was held every three years. After the completion of the Qingyi Garden and Enke, there were a total of 19 imperial examinations in the Qianlong Dynasty. Among the nineteen champions, Bi Yuan and Pan Shien can still be remembered, both of whom are first-rank officials. Among them, the name of the person who was named the number one scholar in high school on the gold list for one year was called Jinbang. This man resigned and returned to his hometown because of his grandfather's illness after only a few years in the Imperial Academy.
Take a look at a poem of Zao Jiantang written by Lao Gan: "The spring water in Kunming is full of smoke and light, along the algae Jiantang of pan-cause. The lakes and mountains inside and outside return to the tranquility, and the high and low peaches and willows are always clear. Most of the eulogies are called Wufang. If you are looking for Jinyi by the bamboo forest, the monkey will remember the long." The last line of the poem mentions an allusion "Monkey Announcement", the monkey is "Jin Yi", Shangshu Shantao of the Western Jin Dynasty. According to their talents, the monkeys recommended talents to Sima Yan, Emperor Wu of Jin Dynasty. One year later, they summarized the achievements of these people as officials and made them public, which is called monkey notices. The evaluation of officials' character, ability, level, and quality by the monkey posters explained his criteria for selecting officials. This poem also shows that the original intention of Laogan's title Zao Jiantang was to select talents, but if it was only for marking the palace examination, the utilization rate of Zao Jiantang would be too low. Therefore, Lao Gan often gathers people here to compose poems and compare them, from which he observes the parameters of each person's character, writing style, talent and so on.
After the arrival of new China, at first the secretary of the Beijing Municipal Party Committee, Peng Zhen, worked here and became the Peng Office. Later, it was the birthplace of the Chinese Academy of Painting, where masters from all walks of life painted Chinese paintings. Since then, Beijing has taken back the management, and it still does not belong to the Summer Palace industry.
Going further north along the shore of the lake, you can see a dirt mountain in the west. This dirt mountain should also be the lake mud piled up when Emperor Qianlong hired migrant workers to dredge the Wengshan Pond. Seeing the buildings on the dirt hill from a distance, it was right to think about it. This old man will build a building when he sees the hill, and he will definitely not let this dirt hill go. There are trails to climb up the dirt hill.
Going up the hill to the building, it turned out to be a courtyard surrounded by low walls.
The yard faces south from the north, but actually faces southeast. There are two pavilions on the east and west sides of the courtyard. Look at the pavilion on the west side.
This is an octagonal square pavilion, with a two-foot-high green brick base underneath, with hanging belts running from north to south. On the top of the pavilion is a pointed roof with raised beams and gray tiles, double eaves and octagonal spires. There is a brick covered bowl on the bearing terrace as a ridge brake. Above the waist eaves is a false building made of partition windows, and on the beams below are official Soviet-style paintings, painted on the purlins and backing boards. There are lintels up and down between the pillars. Red pillars and green Fangsu-style painted, quite a beautiful pavilion.
There is also a pavilion at the corresponding position on the east side of the courtyard, this time it is a hexagonal square pavilion with steps from east to west, and everything else is the same as the octagonal pavilion on the west side.
The courtyard is a platform built, and there is a stepping step in front of the courtyard. The courtyard wall is very short, only as high as the chest. I said last time that such a wall is called a parapet. The courtyard gate is very simple, just a gap in the courtyard wall, without frame or threshold. When I entered the yard, it was very neat. The front is the main house facing south.
There is a wing room in each of the east and west.
Below the main room is a two-foot-high base, and in front of it there is a vertical belt stepping out of the steps, with a width of five rooms. I walked over to see its depth, and saw that it was three rooms deep, and I saw that there were double coupons on the top to connect the roof.
The door of the main room is opened in the open, and the second room has a sill wall and sill window, with brocade lattice flowers every step of the way. There is a circle of eaves porch, and there are lintels between the columns of the porch. On the top is the top of the mountain with double coupons for lifting beams and gray tiles to build a single-eave rolling shed. On the beams under the eaves are official Soviet-style paintings, with red pillars and green squares.
The east and west wing rooms have the same shape, with three rooms wide and one room deep, with doors open in the open room. There is a circle of eaves corridors, and there are lintels up and down between the pillars of the corridors. The above are all gray tiles with raised beams and single eaves rolling sheds on the top of the mountain.
The front eaves corridors of the main house and wing rooms are connected by corner corridors, making the three houses a whole.
A Chinese pine tree is planted in front of the main house, and three magnolia trees are planted in front of the wing room. The layout and architecture in this yard are very grand, beyond the imagination of the folks.
The plaque "Changguantang" hung under the eaves of the main house means a wide field of vision and a hundred miles at a glance. There is a pair of couplets on the colonnade in the Ming Dynasty: the Nongcui screen of Xishan is displayed, and the silver mirror of Beizhu is opened. Screen Exhibition: Same as the Lixiu Exhibition Screen in the couplet between Lancui on Nanhu Island, they both refer to the West Mountain. Beizhu (Nianzhu) is the West Lake of Kunming, Liuyin is the silvery light of the lake water, and mirror image of course means that the water is as quiet as a mirror.
There is only a plaque "Xuan Tu Rui Sui" in the East Wing.
The term Xuantu originally refers to Xuanyuan's schemes, and it comes from Han Yu's "He Ji Empress Dowager Table" in the Tang Dynasty "Hua Xu really praises Xuantu, Wenmu has light in Zhoudao". Hua Xu is the mother of Fuxi and Nuwa, the first grandmother of the Chinese nation. She is also the distant grandmother of Xuanyuan Huangdi. Without Huaxu, there would be no Huangdi, so Han Yu said that the great achievements of Huangdi came from Huaxu. The picture of Xuan in this plaque refers to the gorgeous picture, of course it refers to the appearance of Qingyi. Huo (Nianyu) means Huoyun, three-color cloud, a sign of auspiciousness.
There is also only a plaque in the west wing room, "Xuanxia Qiyue".
Xuan: gorgeous; Qi: gorgeous. Is it said on the plaque that the morning glow sets off the Xiaoyue or the evening glow accompanies the moon? Readers experience it for themselves.
None of these plaque couplets have been signed, no matter who wrote it, the one who wrote it must be a veteran. Lao Gan also wrote a small poem for Changguantang to accompany the couplets in the main house, saying: "Yantang is based on Chongding, and looks far away from Xuming." The air is cool to the west mountain, and the water is close to the north Zhuqing. The clouds return to Xiudan, and the lotus reflects the waves. The bottom line is that the view is smooth, and the rain is almost flat.
From the 15th to the 20th year of Qianlong was the intensive construction period of Qingyi Garden, and most of the buildings were built in these few years; only one-fifth of them were added after that. Changguantang is a small garden built in the 30th year of Qianlong, destroyed in the 10th year of Xianfeng, and rebuilt in the Guangxu period. Some people say that Changguantang was built in imitation of the "Jiaoshi Mingqin" by the West Lake in Hangzhou. The Jiaoshi Mingqin was built when Li Wei, governor of Zhejiang Province in the Yongzheng Dynasty, dredged the West Lake. Several white-walled gray tile pavilions are called Jiaoshi Shanfang. There is an octagonal pavilion outside it. During the period of the Republic of China, Kang Youwei bought a mountain house in Jiaoshi, remodeled it, and renamed it "Kangzhuang", and carved the book "Jiaoshi Mingqin" on the stone. Now it is called "Liuzhuang", and it is in the West Lake State Guesthouse, which belongs to the provincial cultural relic protection unit in Zhejiang.
Thirty years of Qianlong (AD 1765), the fourth trip to the south. I went to the West Lake with my mother and relatives. One day, I had dinner at the Jiaoshi mountain house. After breakfast, Lao Gan discussed with Empress Nala, intending to promote the accompanying imperial concubine Ling to the title of imperial concubine. The queen's objection was invalid, and she cut off her hair and swore to become a nun. In the Qing Dynasty, only parents and husbands who died could shave their hair and mourn. The old man said, "Didn't you curse me and the queen mother?" Fu Long'an, who brought in an escort, said "the queen is crazy", and ordered Fu Long'an to send the queen back to the capital without even having dinner. After returning to Beijing, Queen Nala was banned in the back hall of Yikun Palace and deposed, and the four treasures of concubine, noble concubine, imperial concubine and empress were confiscated. In April, Lao Gan toured the palace in the south, and in May, he canonized Ling Guifei as Ling Huang Guifei. The following year, Queen Nala died.
In the 30th year of Qianlong, major events such as abolishing the empress and establishing the emperor and noble concubine took place. Ordinarily, Lao Gan should be physically and mentally exhausted, but he didn't delay in having fun. This year, Qingyi Garden built Changguan Hall. You said that it is Changguan Hall built after the Jiaoshi mountain house in the West Lake? I don't think he would have taken a fancy to the unfortunate place where the queen went crazy, and he never went to the Jiaoshi mountain house after his southern tour, and there was no word "Jiaoshi" in his poem on the scenery.
Go to the back of the main room and have a look.
There is a plaque at the back without a couplet, and the plaque is "Gongchen holding the scene". Chen is Beichen, the North Star. Gongchen is Gongwei Beichen, that is, sitting here at the West Palace Gate to guard Longevity Hill. Hold the scene? In ancient times, there was a saying about holding Yu Huaijin, which was Qu Yuan saying that he had the world in mind and had great achievements in governing the world. Laogan inscribed this plaque to say "Ren Er holds Yu Huaijin, I only hold Jiajing ears"?
Go to the west side of the main house and have a look.
There is a gap in the courtyard wall on the south side of the west room, allowing people to enter and exit the north steps of the octagonal pavilion outside the courtyard.
Standing behind the west wing and looking west, there are all blinding trees, and you can't see the "Xishan Nongcui screen exhibition" mentioned in the old couplet. At sunset, of course, it is difficult to see the "brilliant clouds and beautiful moon" mentioned on the plaque of the west wing room.
Walking to the side of the East Wing, you can watch the water surface of Kunming West Lake.
The old cadre couplet said that "the silver mirror of the Beizhu River opens", which must be what it means to see it. Therefore, the plaque "Xuan Tu Rui Sui" was inscribed in the East Wing.
The location of Changguan Hall is very close to the West Palace Gate of the Summer Palace. Although the West Palace Gate is far away from Longevity Hill, it was established in the 19th year of Qianlong. After leaving the west gate, it is now called Beiwu. Rice has been produced since ancient times, and there are large rice fields, which are still there today.
It is said that Laogan once looked at the rice fields here in Changguantang, trying to figure out the agricultural harvest this year. You can also enjoy rice harvesting by men and threshing by women, as well as rich rent collection. Now standing in Changguantang, you can’t see the rice fields in Beiwu. The Xijiao Line of the light rail has a stop at the west gate of the Summer Palace. Get off and go to Beiwu to see the rice fields.
After exiting the Changguan Hall, it is very convenient to stand on the West Bank of Kunming West Lake to watch the West Causeway.
Going north along the shore, you will see a sluice.
This is called "Zhongdi Sluice". Inside the gate is Kunming West Lake, and outside the gate is Southwest Lake, which is west of Kunming Lake and north of Kunming West Lake. In the 1950s, the city of Beijing developed rapidly, and the Ming Tombs Reservoir and Miyun Reservoir were successively built in the water sources in the north of Beijing to supply water to the capital. In the early 1960s, the Jingmi Diversion Canal was built. The southern section of the canal used the Yuan Dynasty Baifuyan waterway outside the Qinglong Gate to connect to the Southwest Lake in the Summer Palace. After passing through the Southwest Lake, it was connected to the Changhe River south of the Xiuyi Bridge. After the construction of the Jingmi Diversion Canal, the above sluice was built on the embankment between Kunming West Lake and the Southwest Lake to isolate Kunming Lake from the Jingmi Diversion Canal. Next to the gate is an iron fence along the west bank of Kunming West Lake, which isolates tourists from the Southwest Lake. In order to allow tourists to enjoy the Southwest Lake of the Summer Palace, several viewing windows were opened on the iron fence.
You can see Yuquan Mountain here in autumn.
The tall pagoda is the Yufeng Pagoda of Xiangyan Temple in Yuquan Mountain, and the smaller one is the White Pagoda of Miaogao Temple. Here you can also see a small island in the shade of green trees in Southwest Lake.
There was also a building on this island when it was in Qingyi Garden. It was a round city with two walls inside and outside, and doors opened on all sides. There are towers on the outer city gate, and the four towers are connected by corridors. Inside the city is a three-storey pavilion with a cross-shaped structure that protrudes from all sides. On the south-facing side, there is a plaque inscribed by Emperor Qianlong "Zhijing Pavilion". Governance is governance, and a mirror is a mirror. Lao Gan himself wrote a poem for Zhijing Pavilion: "In the center of the Huage marsh, take a leisurely sail. The ground is high without heat, and there is a cool breeze after the rain. I only feel ashamed of my humble palace, and my thoughts are like water. As the name suggests, governance, The mirror ring has been detailed since ancient times." He himself once said that governing the mirror is "one is mirroring the ancient governance, good governance and bad governance; the other is mirroring the present governance, respecting victory and neglecting victory." It means taking the past as a mirror to learn from the present. Don't look at Lao Gan's high-sounding words, in fact, the upper level of the Zhijing Pavilion is a bronze statue of the Western Buddha of Infinite Life. He himself walked up and down on the city tower to look at the scenery in all directions, and even blew the westerly wind after the rain.
This Zhijing Pavilion used to be called Yuancheng, and later it was referred to as "Tuancheng" by the people. The island was called Tuancheng Island, and the lake was also called Tuancheng Lake. There is also a Tuancheng in Beijing, outside the south gate of Beihai Park.
Lao Gan built three islands and three buildings on Wengshan Po. During the period of Qinhuang and Hanwu, the emperor was thirsty for immortals. When Qin Shihuang visited the sea in the east, he heard people say that the immortals were on the sea, so he bowed to the sea there and asked the immortals for help. Seeking immortals failed, so the first emperor sent people into the sea to search for immortals. Although these people were not mud cows, they disappeared without a trace when they entered the sea. The place where Qin Shihuang worshiped the sea was recorded, and it was later named Qinhuangdao. If Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty wanted to build up the great cause of Emperor Qin, he also needed the help of immortals. Seeing that Emperor Qin's search for immortals was futile, he thought of another way. He dug a large pit outside Jianzhang Palace and filled it with water from Kunming Pool. Manying called it "Taiye Pool" and said it was Beihai. He piled up three rockery mountains in Taiye Pool, saying they were Yingzhou, Penglai and Fangzhang, because someone told him that gods lived on those three mountains, and he built these three mountains to invite gods to live there. Later, Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty Liu Ao (Nian Ao) married Zhao Feiyan in "Huan Fat Yan Thin", and he often took Feiyan to visit the immortals in the three mountains of Taiyechi.
The three mountains in Taiye Pool were later called the Three Mountains of One Water, representing the fairyland on the sea. When Laogan built Qingyi Garden, he also imitated Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty’s one water and three mountains. He built Nanhu Island, Zaojiantang Island and Zhijingge Island on the water of Wengshan Po, symbolizing Penglai, Yingzhou and Abbot. Did Lao Gan also marry a beauty like Zhao Feiyan? I didn't see anyone he praised, so I didn't dare to guess.
In fact, before Lao Gan, there was another emperor who was looking for immortals in Beijing. During the Liao and Jin Dynasties, the current Beihai Park is the Royal Royal Garden. When Kublai Khan built the capital of the Yuan Dynasty, he built Beihai into a royal park, and that piece of water was also called Taiye Pool. In the Yuan Dynasty, there were no three mountains in Taiye Pool, but there was also a Tuancheng. That Tuancheng was Master Hu's Yingzhou, and Qionghua Island was counted as Penglai. The cornerstone of Kublai Khan's Jianyuan capital is still in Tuancheng, Beihai, which is the big jade sea in Dushan.
In the tenth year of Xianfeng, the British and French allied forces rushed into Qingyi Garden to destroy it. When they came to the West Causeway and set fire to it, they saw Zhijing Pavilion. Because no boat crossed the water and set fire to the island, they set up artillery on the shore to bombard Zhijing Pavilion and destroy the pavilion. During the reign of Guangxu, the Summer Palace was rebuilt, but the budget was not enough to rebuild the Zhijing Pavilion. Not only did the pavilion not be restored, but the bricks, stones and wood from Zhijing Pavilion were transported away to repair other buildings. Now there is only the ruins of Zhijing Pavilion.
Cross the Yudai Bridge to the north and follow the waterway outside the bridge. There is a piece of water in front of it. It is so small that it can only be called a pond. This waterway and pond should be a section of Yuhe River in ancient times, which can lead to Yuquan Mountain. If you walk along the path, the first thing you see is the back of a water pavilion on the east bank of the pond. This water pavilion faces west, and what you see from the east is its back.
This water pavilion is not big, just a hut. The surface is three rooms wide and one room deep. On the top is a hard mountain top with raised beams and gray tiles with single eaves. On the back there is an open pavilion with a pair of couplets hanging on the eaves and pillars. "Tantuo Creek connects the six bridges with smoke, and the twin lakes are sandwiched with mirrors and swinging orchids." Tantuo said that this pond is a quiet harbor, and the smoke of the stream is of course the smoked willows by the water, and the stream is the Yuhe River outside the Yudai Bridge. Shuanghu refers to Kunming Lake and this pond, the mirror refers to the circle formed by the arch of the jade belt bridge and the reflection in the water, and Lanwei refers to the boat. This time, Laogan borrowed Li Bai's poem "Two waters sandwich a mirror, and two bridges fall into a rainbow", but there is only one bridge here. So I said in the last episode that if there is a "mirror between two waters", it can only be the Jade Belt Bridge.
Turn around and look at the front of the water pavilion, which is the west-facing side.
There is a plaque and a couplet in front of it. The plaque reads "Chengxian Hall". Does Lao Gan mean that the water here is clear and the river is full of fresh food? But the ancients said that "when the water is clear, there will be no fish". I guess Lao Gan is a metaphor for the second half of the ancient saying, which is called "people who observe well will have no disciples", that is, if you are strict with others and treat yourself leniently, you will have no friends. As an emperor, he must always supervise people strictly, so he has no real friends around him, and he is all flatterers. However, Laogan was unwilling to reconcile, so the title of Chengxiantang requires clear water and fish.
Take a look at what Lao Gan wrote in his poem for Chengxiantang: "The stream hall is responsible for its reality and its name, and Yuzhi is still on the lake. You see, when the old man was thinking about how to inscription, Si Xu suddenly thought of the word "Chengxian". He must have thought of another line in Li Bai's poem "The autumn is so green, the sea is clear and fresh". Li Bai is talking about Dongting Lake, which is larger than the pond in front of him. The "Chengxian" in Li Bai's poems also has a source. It comes from Xie Lingyun's "Clouds and the sun reflect each other, and the sky and water are clear and fresh", which refers to the current Oujiang River near Wenzhou. Xie Lingyun is the originator of landscape poetry, and Li Bai has a deep love for Xie's poems. Li Xie's poems describe the freshness of the sky and the water of rivers and lakes, not "the water is clear and there are many fish". Standing in front of this water pavilion, Lao Gan also thinks of this "empty water and clear water". Thinking about it, the pond was full of clear water and microwaves back then, but now it's a muddy yellow, which makes people unbearable to look at.
In the Ming Dynasty, a couplet was hung on the eaves and pillars: "The scenery in spring is as beautiful as it was, and the clouds in Xishan are spewing out new ones." This is a tribute to the prosperity of all things in spring.
There is a stone pier in front of Chengxiantang, which is small in scale and can only berth small boats like Qingge and Lanrong. If Laogan takes the Yudai Bridge waterway to Jingming Garden in Yuquan Mountain, it is said that he often disembarks here for a rest, drinks a pot of tea in Chengxiantang, eats three peanuts, steams one, boils one and frys the other. According to this ancient function, this Chengxiantang opened a teahouse, which was closed during the epidemic.
Standing on the pier and turning around, I saw three buildings connected by corridors on the north bank of the pond.
There is a corridor extending northward on the north wall of Chengxian Hall.
Walk into the verandah to lead the way to the north.
Going to the corridor on the north bank, there are many stone carvings inlaid on the corridor wall, just like the corridor of Yiyun Pavilion.
This is the stone carving of "Pictures of Farming and Weaving". The first stone carving is "Art and Chen Benji" inscribed by Emperor Qianlong's imperial pen, the second is the preface written by Emperor Qianlong, and then there are poems and paintings of farming and weaving pictures. This large area is the plowing and weaving scenic spot in the period of Qingyi Garden.
During the Shaoxing period, the painter of the Southern Song Dynasty and the magistrate of Yuqian County, Zhejiang Province, Lou Xuan (Nian Shu) made a set of "Plowing and Weaving Pictures" and gave it to Gaozong Zhao Gou, including 21 farming pictures and 24 weaving pictures. The picture is accompanied by a five-character poem. This set of "Pictures of Farming and Weaving" is the earliest accompanying text in China with pictures of men farming and women weaving. It played the most intuitive and easy-to-understand propaganda role in the emperor's persuasion to teach farming and mulberry, and was highly praised by successive emperors. Many painters of later generations copied it, and foreign painters also copied it for their emperors and presidents to persuade the people to cultivate and weave, especially in Japan and North Korea.
Lou Xuan painted a total of two sets of "Plowing and Weaving Pictures", the original was presented to Emperor Gaozong, and the copy was kept at home. Emperor Gaozong ordered the court painter to copy a set of pictures, which is called the royal copy. The original copy of "The Map of Farming and Weaving" in the Song Dynasty has long been lost, and the royal copy of "The Map of Farming and Weaving" has also disappeared for a long time. In the twenty-eighth year of Kangxi (AD 1689), during his tour to the south, he occasionally obtained a Song royal copy of "Plowing and Weaving", which was collected in the palace and is now in the Forbidden City. Uncle Kang ordered the court painters to redraw the Qing farming and weaving album according to the meaning of the Song version, and also published it for promotion. Take a look at the modern printed version of Kangxi's "Pei Wen Zhai Farming and Weaving Map".
Did you see it? Uncle Kang's version of the picture already has a perspective drawing method, which is a lot more advanced than that of the Song Dynasty.
The copy of Lou Xuan was handed down by his grandsons through stone carvings. Since the beginning of the Yuan Dynasty, all dynasties since the Song Dynasty have had copies of Lou Xuan. Emperor Qianlong obtained a set of copies made by Cheng Chi (Nian Qi) in the Yuan Dynasty, called Cheng Molou Edition, which is the most beautiful copy among the copies. Lao Gan engraved a set of stones and embedded them on the wall of this veranda in Qingyi Garden, and then stored Cheng Molou's version of "Pictures of Farming and Weaving" in a box and hid them in the Guizhi Mountain Hall of Duojiaxuan in Yuanmingyuan. In the tenth year of Xianfeng, the Anglo-French allied forces burned the Old Summer Palace and Qingyi Garden, the stone carvings of "Plowing and Weaving" were destroyed, and the picture of Cheng Molou was looted, and it is now preserved in the United States. After the People's Republic of China, the remnants of the "Plowing and Weaving Picture" in Qingyi Garden were hidden in the Chinese History Museum.
The Farming and Weaving Scenic Area of Qingyi Garden was also burned down by the British and French allied forces in the tenth year of Xianfeng. It was not restored during the Guangxu period, but a water exercise school was built. In 2004, the Summer Palace cleaned up the site, restored most of the buildings in the Qingyi Garden period, and engraved a set of stone carvings of the Qianlong version of "Plowing and Weaving" on the corridor walls. Take a look at one of the stone carvings on the wall, "Transplanting Seedlings".
The three buildings connected in series by the veranda, walk along the veranda to see the first building.
These are three open pavilions on the east side, with raised beams, gray tiles and single-eave rolling sheds hanging from the top of the mountain, with red columns and green squares, painted in Su style, with lintels above and below the columns. In the Ming Dynasty, a plaque "Yuhe Zhai" was hung. The pond here was a section of Yuhe River in ancient times, so the title is Xuan Yuhe Zhai. In the Ming Dynasty, a couplet was hung on the eaves and pillars: "The rain in the bays is heavy, and the banks contain the wind and the fragrance of millet." Wild rice grass and cattail grass are wormwood near the water; grass and millet are crops, and rice is ground into white rice and yellow rice. Before Laogan set up this fast, he chanted: "The Yuhe River is connected by Yuquan five miles away, and every time it finds its source, it goes back. The sound of Yiya oars knows the distance, and the cauliflower yellows the red boat." It shows that the Yuhe Waterway from Yudai Bridge to Yuquan Mountain is five miles away, and his dragon boat is red.
There are five big rooms in the middle, the hall room in the bright room, and three open rooms in front of the building.
The single-eave rolling shed with raised beams and gray tiles rests on the top of the mountain, surrounded by a circle of verandahs, red pillars and green squares, painted in Soviet style, and lintels between the pillars. The plaque "Yan Shang Zhai" is hung in the Ming room of Changxuan. Yan means extension, and appreciation means appreciation. Li Daoyuan of the Northern Wei Dynasty said that "the peaks and mountains are connected, and the streams are filled with smoke, the springs and streams attract fog, the wind is blowing in the fields, and the mountains are touched to extend the rewards". A pair of couplets is hung on the eaves and pillars of the open room: "Looking at the willow will gradually soften; the color of the flowers and trees will be divided." This is what I saw here in early spring. There is also a pair of couplets hanging on the eaves of the main house: "The room by the stream hears the weaving of looms; the bank near the fields sees plowing and hoeing". The 杼 (mind pillar) is the shuttle of the loom.
On the west side is a four-corner pavilion.
The face is three rooms wide, with raised beams and gray tiles, single eaves and four corners with pointed roofs, and brick carvings supporting the terrace ridge brake. The red pillars and green squares are painted in Su style, and there are lintels between the pillars. There is no couplet on this gazebo, did the old man forget it, or was it stolen over the years?
The core of this group of buildings is the Yanshang Zhai, not to mention the largest house, and it also has an open pavilion out of the building. Zhaizhong now has a coffee shop with two curved ruler counters. I walked into the store and ordered a cup of coffee. He touched his pocket and found it was empty, "If you are willing to spend a penny more, you can buy a plate of bamboo shoots boiled in salt, or fennel beans." Those who wore long gowns walked into the open room in front of the hall, asked for coffee and snacks, and sat and drank slowly. After drinking the hot coffee, I asked the shopkeeper for a tissue to wipe my mouth, and then slowly walked out of the North Gate of Yanshang Zhai. Take a look back.
If the north side is the front, it will be the main house of the big family, with the porch in the front and the mansion in the back. The royal family is no better than the common people, and it does not take corridors and mansions as the norm. There is also a plaque under the corridor of the back eaves, and a pillow plaque "Shuiyinglanxiang" is hung under the eaves. Near Yuanmingyuan Zhigengzhi, there is a place of Yingshui Lanxiang, which is one of the forty sceneries of Yuanmingyuan. Laogan once wrote a poem for him, saying: "How can a garden be a place to visit and observe? Sooner or later, you can rely on the threshold to see the agricultural achievements. Several hectares of yellow clouds and millets are moist with rain, and thousands of green rice fields are cold. The heart is more beautiful than jade, and the nose is so fragrant that there are no more orchids." The day is in the picture of Bin Feng, dare to forget Zhou Song ordered Tian Guan". The last sentence "Zhou Song Ming Tian Guan" refers to "The Book of Songs·Zhou Song·Chen Gong": Alas, Chen Gong! Jinger is in the public. Wang Liercheng, come to consult with Lairu. Alas, Baojie! Spring of Vimo, what more can you ask for? How new she? When the emperor came to Mou, he would receive Jueming. Ming Zhao God, so far with a healthy year. Order all of us: "The money is the money, and the dying watch is the Ai." Among them, the ministers are the field officials, the officials of the Secretary of Agriculture. This is the king of Zhou telling the field officials to pay more attention to farming (Nian Jiase). Here, Laogan borrows the idea of reflecting water orchids in the Old Summer Palace, which means focusing on plowing and weaving.
There are couplets hanging on the pillars of the porch: "I just enjoyed the rain on the side of the ridge, and I saw heavy clouds rising from the edge of the ridge." Cheng (Niancheng) is the field ridge. Just after a night of rain, there are heavy black clouds in Xishan again. Happy rains herald a good year.
To the north of Yanshangzhai is a compound, which is a water exercise school built during the Guangxu period.
In the fifth year of Tongzhi in the Qing Dynasty (1866 A.D.), Zuo Zongtang asked the imperial court to open the "Qiushi Tangyi Bureau" in Fujian, which was the first naval school in China, "Fujian Shipbuilding Academy". In the sixth year of Guangxu (AD 1880), Li Hongzhang invited the imperial court to open the Tianjin Naval Academy, the second naval academy in China, specially designed for the Beiyang Navy. In the eleventh year of Guangxu, the imperial court established the Navy Yamen, and Prince Chun Yizhen (Nianxuan) served as the Prime Minister of the Navy Yamen. At this time, Cixi was planning her residence after returning to power, and wanted to rebuild the Qingyi Garden that was burned by the British and French allied forces. She instructed Yizhen to restore the ancestors' "Kunming Lake Water Exercise Rules", which was the water exercise organized by Qianlong's Jianrui Camp and Firearms Camp in Kunming Lake. During the Qianlong period, the water army was mainly used for inland river defense. The water exercises were dry land soldiers doing radio gymnastics in boats on Kunming Lake. The water exercise of Kunming Lake in the Qianlong period was abandoned long ago, and only one picture remained in the Guangxu period.
Yizhen's motion was immediately approved by Cixi, and the Kunming Lake Water Exercise School was built on the ruins of the plowing and weaving map in Qingyi Garden in the 13th year of Guangxu. Guangxu is about to be in charge at this time, of course he hopes to move the queen mother out of the palace and find a distant place to retire. When Cixi mentioned rebuilding the Summer Palace, Emperor Guangxu wished for immediate success. In fact, this matter has been organized since the tenth year of Guangxu, and it is the decree of Emperor Guangxu on the surface. However, the royal purse has been sluggish, and the progress of the Summer Palace project is not satisfactory. Since Yixuan asked to open the Kunming Lake Water Exercise School, Cixi took the opportunity to hand over the Summer Palace project to the Navy Yamen. At that time, the Beiyang Navy was under construction, with a lot of official money from the imperial court, and Yizhen mixed the Summer Palace project funds and navy procurement funds into one pot. In the end, neither the Beiyang Navy nor the Summer Palace was completed as planned. The Summer Palace project embezzled a large amount of money for the construction of the Navy.
The gate of this water gymnastics school is a hall without a back door. It is three rooms wide and has a verandah at the back. After entering the courtyard, there are only inverted rooms on the east and west sides of the gate hall.
There are nine rooms in each of the east and west, and a group of three rooms. This is the warehouse, right? The next yard is the teaching area. There is a vertical flower door in the teaching area.
This is a hanging flower gate, and there is no hand-painted corridor inside the gate, keeping the seriousness of the school.
Facing the vertical flower gate is the main room of the teaching area, which should be the place where the principal works.
The main house is five rooms wide and three rooms deep, with eaves and corridors at the front and back. The door is opened in the open room, and the front and rear sills and windows are silled in the second room and a little bit. On the top is a hard mountain top with gray tiles and single eaves rolling shed, red pillars and red squares, without painted.
There are east and west wing rooms with the same shape on both sides of the main room.
It is five rooms wide and one room deep, with raised beams, gray tiles, single eaves and rolling sheds, and a hard mountain top. In the yard, two walnut trees were planted in front of the main house, but the one in front of the east house had long since disappeared, and a stone was thrown there to occupy the pit. Two magnolia trees were planted under the south window of the wing room. The one in front of the west room died many years ago, and a small magnolia tree was replanted. The east room is the sleeping room for the promotion office under the head of the hall; the west room is the sleeping room for the supervisory office under the head of the hall.
There are five back rooms behind the east and west rooms. Look at the west room.
This is the front yard of the teaching area. There used to be seven rooms on the east and west sides of the main building. The east side was the student dormitory, and the west side was the teacher's dormitory. Now the two dormitories have not been restored, so they are empty there. A glass greenhouse was built on the open space to the east of the main house, and inside was the remains of a small steamer. I glanced at the introduction on the sign and said it was a gift from the Japanese.
In the 30th year of Guangxu (1904 AD), the Russo-Japanese War broke out. The two countries fought each other on Chinese soil and killed Chinese people. After the war, Japan, as the victorious country, gave the Qing court such a small steamer as a cruise ship in the Summer Palace. Empress Dowager Cixi named it Yonghe Ship. The war between the two countries killed tens of thousands of Chinese people and lost tens of millions of taels of silver. How did Cixi finally get such a small steamer as compensation? Now, the crystal coffin of the Yonghe Wheel is here to show us the traces of that tragic history.
Behind the main house, there are also nine rooms on one side.
It is said that this is a student cafeteria, is it also a classroom? Otherwise, why so much time. Now here is the exhibition room, exhibiting some collections of the Summer Palace. Take a look at this, the open-air Tian'an stone seat is the Luchen seat, most of which are made of white marble and a small amount of white stone.
These exposed seats were originally placed in front of the front hall and back bedroom, and some were along the corridor. In the past few years, it was found that there were many damages, some were natural, and some were man-made. The Summer Palace had to put them all away, and now they are placed here. The pictures on the wall tell you where they were placed in the past.
Below is the stone balustrade, spare parts from the reconstruction of the Summer Palace during the reign of Emperor Guangxu, all brand new, mostly white marble. On the opposite side is the white marble embroidered pier, also known as the drum bench. This kind of stone embroidered pier is placed in the open-air yard. When the owner wants to sit, a maid comes and spreads a piece of embroidered silk on it, so it is called embroidered pier.
have a look at this.
Picked up from Zhijing Pavilion Island, the frontal stone on the north gate of Tuancheng has "Pengdao Haze" inscribed by Lao Gan on it. Yanxia refers to Xia Ruyan, not Yan Ruxia. There is only one of the four forehead stones left in Tuancheng. It seems that Lao Gan regards Zhijing Pavilion as Penglai.
have a look at this.
The white marble sundial in front of Le Shoutang, from the old photos on the wall, was still in front of Le Shoutang during the Republic of China. Look at the photo, the sundial is in front of the bronze crane on the right hand in front of the door, and there should be a similar stone carving in front of the bronze crane on the left hand. When the Summer Palace was rebuilt, clocks had long been used for timekeeping, both domestic and imported, and this sundial was just a ritual vessel. Is the ritual vessel in the left hand lost? It should be Jialiang. If you don’t want to place a good amount, you can also put a moon dial, or at worst, it should be a blank one of the same white marble dew stand.
have a look at this.
This is a kind of watch column, and it is also a spare part. What we often see is the lookout post between the two railings, with the top of the lookout post. The bottle-shaped lookout posts here are called lifting pole lookout posts, which are generally used on small stone bridges. The picture above shows the railings on both sides of the so-called Banbu Bridge in Harmonious Fun Garden. Check out my pictures.
have a look at this.
During the period of Qingyi Garden, there were a group of pavilion buildings on the east and west sides of the Foxiang Pavilion on Longevity Hill. The pavilion on the west was rebuilt when the Summer Palace was rebuilt, and it still exists now, which is the middle reaches of the painting. To the east was a Buddhist building in Qingyi Garden, called Epiphyllum Pavilion. When the Summer Palace was rebuilt, it was converted into a single-storey hall, which is now Jingfu Pavilion. The picture above is the Jingfu Pavilion of Shi Lei when the Summer Palace was rebuilt, which was rejected by Cixi.
The three plinths on the booth were recovered from the ruins of the Epiphyllum Pavilion when the Summer Palace was rebuilt, and they were probably placed in the stone spare parts warehouse. Look at the two cloud-patterned octagonal bowl-covered plinths in front, which are very large. The cloud-patterned octagonal Xumizuo plinth at the back is basically the same diameter as the two front ones. It can be seen from this that the Epiphyllum Pavilion was quite large in those days. The two in front should be the plinths of the Tongtian column in the hall, and the one in the back may be the plinth of the colonnade outside the hall. Another point is that the plinths of this Epiphyllum Pavilion are different from other plinths in the Summer Palace. There are shackle-shaped plinths everywhere in the garden, no matter during the Qianlong or Guangxu years. But the plinth base of the Epiphyllum Pavilion is not shaped, which is very special.
Behind the teaching area is a moon gate, even if it is the north gate of the teaching area.
The moon gate is in the middle distance, simple and generous, without fancy decorations. When you see this section of the wall, you will think of the whitewashed walls in the south, and the wall ridges are also common in the south, with a pattern of gray tiles. There are characters on the front and back of the forehead stone on the door, the front is "Zhiyuan", and the back must be "Tranquility". Looking back, it really is!
This is to teach teachers and students to study with peace of mind and have no distractions. In this way, the forehead stones on the small gate are different from those on the city gate. The platform of the city gate is very large, and there must be a forehead stone at the front and back. On this kind of moon gate, because the wall is very thin, there is a frontal stone that runs through the front and back on the wall. This frontal stone has characters carved on both sides.
Entering the backyard, sheds were set up on both sides of the moon gate, and those outdoor seats that could not fit indoors were displayed inside.
There are also a lot of bonsai raised in the yard, among which the sweet-scented osmanthus bonsai is full of blooming blooms on August 15th.
Opposite the Moon Gate are three halls, where logistics assistants may work and sleep.
After passing the hall is the north gate of the Water Exercise School.
The shape and specifications of the north gate and the front south gate are the same. There are seven rooms on the left of the north gate, which they say are kitchens; there are three rooms on the right, which are said to be bathhouses. There are so many students and teachers, and there are only three bathhouses. You can imagine how much Manchurians don't like bathing.
This is the outer water gymnastics school, and there is a courtyard behind the north gate, which is the inner water gymnastics school, also called the back water gymnastics school. The Nei Shui Gymnasium has not been rebuilt, but I have seen workers constructing it, is it going to be rebuilt?
Walking west after exiting the water gymnastics school, there is a small courtyard with red walls on the path among the trees. Going forward to take a look, it turned out to be the Silkworm Temple.
The gate of the arch coupon temple is not open, and there are flagpoles in the courtyard, which are prayer flag columns. The courtyard looks very small, there are only three main halls with gray tiles and single eaves on the hard hilltop, and there is a building in front.
Silkworms are one of the foundations of Chinese agriculture. The source of food and clothing for the Chinese is crops and silkworms, and the farming people are men who farm and women who weave. Therefore, China has had a tradition of offering sacrifices to silkworm gods since ancient times. In ancient times, the gods of silkworms were Mrs. Wanmao (Nian Wanyu) and Princess Yushi, both of whom were master silkworm farmers. The folk sacrifice to the silkworm god is in Xiaoman, and the royal sacrifice to the silkworm god in the Qing Dynasty is on the third day of the lunar calendar. The royal sacrifice to the silkworm god is called the "silkworm ceremony". Since the Zhou Dynasty, the queen led the royal family members to offer the ceremony. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the royal family identified the silkworm god as the Xiling family, the Yuan concubine of Xuanyuan Huangdi, and was called Sister Luo by the people.
Everyone knows that there is a Xiannongtan in the south of the Ming and Qing imperial palaces. The first silkworm altar during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty was located in the north of the imperial palace, in Beihai Park, and is now occupied by Beihai Kindergarten. Every spring, the two chieftains, the emperor and the empress, will do a sacrificial ceremony of men plowing and women weaving. Every year on the day of the first lunar month, the emperor leads a team out of the Meridian Gate to the Xiannong Altar to cultivate and worship Xiannong. The queen led the female relatives out of the Shenwu Gate to the silkworm altar to kiss the silkworms and sacrifice the silkworms. In my Forbidden City post, I said that the offerings for ancestor worship in the Taimiao Temple are too strong, that is, the heads of cattle, sheep and pigs. The queen's offering to the silkworm god was Shaolao, which was the head of a sheep and pig, which was inferior.
Look at Castiglione's record of the silkworm ceremony of Empress Fucha in the ninth year of Qianlong (AD 1744), and a part of "Picture of Empress Xiao Xianchun Kissing Silkworms".
This picture can only be drawn after the death of Empress Fucha, because Empress Xiaoxian is the posthumous title given to her by Emperor Qianlong, and there is absolutely no reason to use it when she is alive. The queen does not have a temple name, she is sacrificed with the emperor, and Emperor Qianlong's temple name is Gaozong. The altar in the picture has been demolished after Beihai Kindergarten occupied Xiancan Altar.
After Emperor Qianlong built the plowing and weaving map of Qingyi Garden, he moved the court's weaving and dyeing bureau here, which should be the location of the water exercise school now. The miniature Silkworm Temple we saw was dedicated to the Weaving and Dyeing Bureau, and the Weaving and Dyeing Bureau sent people to perform sacrifices every year.
After passing the Canshen Temple and continuing westward, you will arrive at the west wall of the Summer Palace. Going north along the west wall, you will see a stele pavilion.
The stele pavilion is a new work, take a look at the stele inside. This is a piece of Kunlun Stone. When you go up and look at it, you can see the words "Picture of Farming and Weaving" clearly written on the south-facing front. There are indistinct inscriptions on the other sides, which should be Lao Gan's poems. When I talked about the Kunlun Stone on the East Causeway last time, I said that stone tablets like the Kunlun Stone were created by Lao Gan. The "Plowing and Weaving Picture" Kunlun Stone is one of the existing ones, and the handwriting is clearer than that of the Kunlun Stone on the East Bank. Check out the tree hole at its base.
According to records, this Kunlun stone is on the bank of Yuhe River, which means that the Jingmi water diversion channel outside the west wall is the Yuhe River in the past. After Lao Gan built the Farming and Weaving Picture Scenic Spot, he wrote a poem, which said: "Yudai Bridge West Farming and Weaving Map, Weaving Clouds and Farming Rain to learn from Eastern Wu. The water, weather and climate are a little like that, and the source of food and clothing is everywhere." In the poem, Soochow refers to the Southern Song painter Lou Xuan; the word "廑吾" is interpreted as "diligence".
After passing the "Plowing and Weaving Picture" Kunlun Stone, continue to the north. Behind the bamboo forest, there is a fence wall and a firewood gate. There are two small mulberry trees in front of the gate.
During the period of Qingyi Garden, this was a village residence, and the village house in Gengzhitu should be here, called Shuicunju. After the reconstruction of the farming and weaving map scenic spot, a teahouse was opened here. Now it is surrounded and rebuilt, and it is estimated that it will no longer be open after the repair.
Laogan once wrote a small poem for this water village dwelling: Weilan boat on the beach, and bamboo doors in the water village. The paths are protected by red flowers, and the houses are surrounded by green poplars. Rice seedling cloth for driving horses, and mulberry leaf fertilizer for silkworm breeding. It's not about leisure and decoration, so as to test the people's dependence.
There are not many ancient mulberries in the plowing and weaving map during the Qianlong period, and green peaches have been planted in many places. If you want to visit the century-old mulberry willow, you have to keep your eyes open and patrol around. I once saw an ancient mulberry tree from the Tang Dynasty at Kaiyuan Temple in Quanzhou. According to legend, the mulberry tree once bloomed with lotus flowers, so the owner of the mulberry garden donated the garden to build a temple. The ancient mulberry tree with lotus blossoms has survived to this day for 1,300 years, and it is called the Sanglian Historic Site. The most famous mulberry tree in history is the Lousang tree at the entrance of Liu Xuande's family village 1,800 years ago. I have been to a Sanyi Palace near Lousang Village. Where is Lou Sang? The local people said, that Lousang? Even Lousang Village has long since disappeared, and what people say about Liu Bei's homestead is all fake. According to records, in the Ming Dynasty, the Lousang tree was still there.
It makes sense for Shuicunju to open a teahouse here. Do you still remember Wang Wei's "Wei City is rainy in the morning and the dust is light, and the guesthouses are green and willows look new. I advise you to drink a glass of wine, and go west to Yangguan without old friends." Don't look at the green willows around this water village house, but after this village, there will be no such shop. You must have a glass of wine in this water village house.
Going forward is the Jiehu Bridge. Even if the west of the West Causeway is finally seen, only the mist and boats are left.
The water mist covers the willow smoke, and the sky cannot be seen in the mist. Autumn cicadas sing in bursts, and you will know the river when you hear the waves. I don't know what to do with my wings, and I am lost in a boat along the stream. When the chaos and mist dissipate at noon, the empty water will be clear and fresh.
(to be continued)
