The Dabaoen Yanshou Temple was actually a Lama Temple. When the Manchus were outside the customs, they built some lama temples, and there were only Tibetan and Mongolian lamas who chanted scriptures inside, and there were no Manchu lamas. After entering the customs, gradually more Manchu people entered the temple to chant scriptures. Almost all the newly built Buddhist temples in the capital of the Qing Dynasty were Lama temples, and there were more than 30 large temples in records alone. The original Han Temple was rebuilt and restored, and the imperial court did not prohibit it. The Dabaoen Yanshou Temple was also built by Qianlong and sent lamas to chant scriptures. These lamas are all Manchus.
In the Qing Dynasty, the abbots of the lamasery were graded. The highest one was the Da Lama, who sat in the high-level Buddhist temples; the Da Lama lived in the low-level temples. Dabaoen Yanshou Temple lives in Dalai Lama, whose rank is not high. This Da Lama was sent by the Lifan Academy, and he was mainly in charge of management, so he probably didn't have much skill in teaching scriptures. The lama was also transferred from the Lifan Academy after training in other temples, and he recited the Manchu scriptures that Qianlong asked Zhangjia Guoshi to organize to translate. It is not known whether these lamas were taken away by the Lifan Academy in the tenth year of Xianfeng (AD 1860) and sent elsewhere, or escaped into the rivers and lakes. Anyway, the Da Lama of this temple is not a celebrity in the Buddhist world, and there is no record.
Paiyun Hall has halls in the courtyard, as well as the Buddha Incense Pavilion and Wisdom Sea above the Dehui Hall, which are all buildings in the middle road. From Yunhui Yuyu Archway to the glazed hall on the top of Longevity Mountain, the axis of the middle road is not straight, probably due to the influence of the mountain. In addition to the middle road building, it also has some auxiliary buildings arranged up and down on the east and west sides. There is a trail on the east side of the back of Dehui Hall, and there is a small gate after going down.
After leaving this small gate, there is a subsidiary facility of the Dabaoen Yanshou Temple, which is Zhuanlunzang. In the past, you can go in and visit. Although the prayer wheel inside has collapsed, the skeleton is still there, and the hall is full of scars and dilapidated scenes. It was repaired a few years ago, and then it was closed and no one was allowed to enter. They said that the last renovation only rebuilt the exterior, and the interior was not repaired, so it can only be seen from a distance. Now I can only stand on the platform at the turn-back of the big ladder of Foxiang Pavilion and look at it from the west side of Zhuanlunzang.
From the back of Dehui Hall, you can go directly to the lower platform of the eight-character ladder in front of Zhuanlunzang. In the past, when I went to Zhuanlunzang, I went down the stacked stone rockery outside the Foxiang Pavilion. I went through a series of caves to the back of the uppermost floor of Zhuanlunzang. I walked around the yard and then came out from this horoscope ladder.
Zhuanlun Zang was also built along the mountain. The first platform is the first platform under the horoscope ladder, surrounded by walls. After going up, there is another circle of walls. In the middle of the wall is a wooden archway on the first floor with two towering pillars. In fact, this is a ritual gate, which can be regarded as the front gate of Zhuanlun Zang. Don't look at it as a Yimen, but it is very gorgeously decorated. There are gold-pasted dragon paintings on the pillars, or green glazed tiles on the top of the mountain, and there are immortals riding chickens and a ridge beast on the vertical ridge, which is very exaggerated.
After passing through the Yimen Gate and going up a ladder, there is the courtyard of Zhuanlun Zang. There is a stone tablet in the middle of the courtyard, and the runners are very conspicuous hidden on the left and right sides of the Foxiang Pavilion, because of this stone tablet. The white stele is the most attractive against the background of Longevity Hill, and it can be seen directly on Kunming Lake.
This monument is one of the symbols of Qingyi Garden, so the specification is very high. There is a foot high green brick platform under it, with steps leading out from front to back. There is a circle of white marble handrails on the platform base, and there are also such handrails when stepping out of the steps. The stone stele sits in the middle of the base, and the base of the stele is a six-foot-tall white marble xumizuo, and the girdle is all embossed with gods, not Bodhisattvas. The body of the stele is a whole piece of white granite, and the cap of the stele is covered with embossed clouds and dragons. The top of the white stone stele is a pointed top with four corners, and there are lotus reliefs on the side and the slope, and on the top is the covered bowl pagoda on the lotus seat. The most amazing thing is that on each of the four vertical ridges there is a stone sculpture of a dragon riding on its back, which reminds you immediately of the roof of the Yuhua Pavilion in the Forbidden City. Yuhua Pavilion is a mandala hall, which was built in the same period as Qingyi Garden, one or two years earlier.
On the front of the stele is the golden lacquer "Longevity Mountain Kunming Lake" in Qianlong's handwriting, and the seal of "Imperial System" is on the cap of the stele. On the back is the imperial manuscript "Kunming Lake Chronicle of Longevity Mountain", which was signed in Changzhi month of the 16th year of Qianlong, that is, December 1751 AD. According to Lao Gan's "Records", he is building water conservancy here to benefit the people of the capital. By the way, "the Yanshou Temple was built in the sun of the mountain", that is because "this year, the empress dowager will celebrate her 60th birthday...so you". In fact, he wanted to build a temple back then, so he dug a lake by the way. He said the opposite, not because he was worried about booing in the court, but because he was afraid that future generations would be cast aside. However, this is the last royal garden in Chinese history and the only one preserved. If Lao Ganchu hadn't built this garden, everyone would have no royal gardens to visit now, and could only hang around in the small courtyards of officials in Su and Yang. And I don't have such a good post to write, woohoo. So, from this point of view, it is well deserved for Lao Gan to set up a monument of merit and virtue for himself here? And he also asked people to choose some nice poems from his imperial poems on Longevity Mountain and Kunming Lake, and engrave them on both sides of the stone tablet.
This monument is similar to the chronicle monument in front of the Daxiong Hall in the temple, that is, the merit monument of Qingyi Garden, which is of great significance. In the 26th year of Qianlong, Qingyi Garden was basically completed; in the 29th year, it was completely completed. Lao Gan specially made a green and white jade seal "Longevity Hill Qingyi Garden" to commemorate it. The four sides of the jade seal are engraved with Lao Gan's imperial book "The Story of the Qingyi Garden in Wanshou Mountain", which mentions that ""The Story of Kunming Lake in Wanshou Mountain" was written in Xinwei, and it records the reason for water control, the renaming of the mountain, and the beginning of the lake. The Qingyi Garden on Wanshou Mountain was completed in Xinsi, and now I am working as a reporter to set up a topic, sometimes delaying it, and it is also difficult to word it....If I contradict my original words, I can’t live up to my heart .Although the garden is completed, we go there in the morning and return at noon, but we haven’t spent the night. It’s still the original intention. Maybe there is an understanding.” After Lao Gan expanded the Old Summer Palace, he said that he would no longer waste money and people to build gardens. Qingyi Garden violated the foreword, so it was "difficult to say". From then on, I had no choice but to enter the garden after breakfast and go home after lunch, saying that I would not spend the night in the garden, and hoped that everyone "may also forgive me."
In fact, Lao Gan has visited Qingyi Garden a lot, otherwise, where would there be those five, seven, or eight small poems on Wanshou Mountain in Kunming Lake? The seal of "Longevity Mountain Qingyi Garden" mentioned above was taken away by the British and French allied forces, and it is now in the British Museum. I didn't see this seal twice when I went there. They hide it very deep and dare not let Chinese tourists see it. But it is recorded in "Ri Xia Jiu Wen Kao".
Behind the stele of Kunming Lake in Wanshou Mountain are surrounded by three buildings in Zhuanlunzang. The main hall is Zhuanlunzang, two-story pavilion style, two bright and two dark, a total of four floors. The main hall is three rooms wide and three rooms deep. There are eaves corridors around the first floor and eaves corridors on the second floor. Open the door in the open room, and sill the wall and sill the window in the second room. There is an upside-down lintel between the pillars, and a stool lintel underneath. The second floor is a handrail. The three-story roofs are made of bucket arches and beams, and green glazed tiles. The roof of the main hall is very peculiar. It is called three coupons hooked together with four corners to form a steeple. The ridge brake is made of colored glaze to make standing statues of the three immortals "Fu", "Lu" and "Shou". Zhuanlun Zang is a form of Buddhist scripture building, as well as Buddhist temple buildings. Standing on the roof of the Tibetan scripture building is a Chinese god (recited miraculously), which is very miraculous.
There is also a wonderful thing about the roof of the main hall. There is a circle of hanging flowers and pillars outside the brackets under the eaves. There are lintels between the pillars and a layer of collars on it. This is not a shading board, it should be a decoration under the eaves and eaves, which is specially blocked from the bucket arch, and it can be called "dougong shade board". There is also such a decorative piece under the flat seat on the second floor to block the first floor of the bucket arch. Under the big eaves in rainy areas in the south, there is a rafter board to block the rafter head inside, which is to avoid rain and prevent the rafter from rotting quickly from the end.
Although there are quite a lot of floors in the main hall, they are actually fake buildings. If you have the opportunity to go in and visit, you will find that there is a passage to the top inside, so that the internal space is large enough. The octagonal prayer wheel inside is so big that only the frame remains. The Buddhist altars and scripture drawers above are gone, and it seems that there is still a push rod on a millstone, can it still turn? I went in N many years ago, that's how it is in my memory. In the Zhihua Temple in Lumicang, Dongcheng, Beijing, there is a very well-preserved Ming Dynasty runner collection. Although it is not as big as the one in the Summer Palace, it is quite well preserved and very beautiful. There is a Zhuanlun Zang in Longxing Temple in Zhengding, which is about the same size as the one in the Summer Palace. It was from the Song Dynasty, and only the frame remained.
The east and west side halls of Zhuanlun Zang are two two-story octagonal pavilions, which are the same as the decoration of the main hall. There is a corridor on the second floor between the two octagonal pavilions and the main hall.
In the tenth year of Xianfeng, Zhuanlunzang escaped the fire of the foreign invaders by chance and survived. However, the internal cultural relics failed to escape the catastrophe, and all the good things were stolen. What you see now is the building after the overhaul in the 14th year of Guangxu (AD 1888), and it was repaired again in the 28th year of Guangxu. It is said to be a major repair, but in fact it has not been restored to the level of the Qingyi Garden period, probably due to plastering and oiling the surface. The new China heavy oil has been used several times, and it was taken off the shelves at the end of the last century for a real overhaul. During the overhaul this time, the colorful glazed Fu Lu Shou on the main hall was replaced, the original was stored in the warehouse, and a fake one was replaced. This set of Fu Lu Shou originals has also appeared in the exhibition, just like the Qi kiss on the main ridge of the Paiyun Hall exhibited in the Dehui Hall.
There is also a walking path on the west side of the Dehui Hall, and there is a small gate after going down.
After leaving this small gate, there is another ancillary facility of the Dabaoen Yanshou Temple, which is the Wufang Pavilion.
Before the new crown epidemic, this Wufang Pavilion could still be visited, but now it is closed.
Wufang Pavilion failed to escape the catastrophe in the tenth year of Xianfeng, and was burned down by the British and French allied forces. In the 14th year of Guangxu, when the Summer Palace was rebuilt, the Wufang Pavilion was rebuilt as it was. In front of the Wufang Pavilion, there is also a horoscope ladder like Zhuanlunzang, but the front of the ladder is slightly wider than Zhuanlunzang, and it is a small square, which is the small square coming down from the trail behind the Dehui Hall. Although this square is very small, it is also very formal. There is a white marble screen wall on the south side, and the original paintings on it have been scraped away by the butcher's knife of the years. Opposite the screen wall is a white stone archway with four pillars and three floors. On the horizontal pillars of the stone archway are excerpts of Laogan's original poems, which have nothing to do with Buddhism, but show a little Zen edge.
Going up from the horoscope ladder is the yard of Wufang Pavilion. The ground of this courtyard is on the same level as that of Zhuanlun Zang, and the area is similar. This is intentional, and I will talk about it later. Above the climbing ladder in the south is a gate hall with a wide face and five rooms. There is a closed corridor in the courtyard, and four turrets at the four corners, with double eaves and pointed roofs at the four corners. The door plaque of "Fulan warm green" hangs on the gate of the mountain gate, which is a sentence from Ouyang Xiu's Lushan Fu, "If you want to make the floating mist warm and emerald in thousands of shapes, you will often sit and lie against the window". Fulan is the mist floating in the mountains, and Nuancui is of course the green mountain scenery. Don't blame Ouyang Xiu for calling verdure a warm color. He is not a painter and has no concept of warm and cold tones.
The main hall of Wufang Pavilion, which is five rooms wide, is on the cliff in the north of the courtyard, and you have to climb up the mountain from the corridor. Under the cliff, there is a side hall with a width of three rooms on the east and west corridors. These gate halls, turrets, main halls, and side halls all have yellow-green variegated glazed tile roofs with bucket arches and beams. spine beast. On the turret is the covered bowl ridge brake on the yellow glazed dew tray, which contrasts with the green roof and is very conspicuous.
In the center of the courtyard of Wufang Pavilion is the core building Baoyun Pavilion on the base of the six-foot-high white stone Xumizuo, which is similar to the stone tablet of "Longevity Mountain and Kunming Lake" on the east side. . Baoyun Pavilion is an all-copper imitation wood square hall, three rooms wide, with imitation bucket arches, raised beams and double eaves resting on the top of the mountain. There are no ridge beasts on the ridges, but there are wind bells hanging below, which are copper bells. The Qing-style covered bowl Tibetan pagoda ridge brake is very realistic, with nine-story phase wheel, canopy, and moon-raising orbs, even the front pot door, and there is a Buddha statue in the pot door. This square hall is very exquisite, comparable to the small golden halls of Jiangshan Sheji on both sides of the platform of the Palace of Qianqing in the Forbidden City, which was the work of the Shunzhi Dynasty. This cast copper square hall is the famous "Summer Palace Copper Pavilion", the only survivor in the Wufang Pavilion. This copper pavilion is the largest existing cast copper building in China, weighing 200 tons, and probably the largest in the world. The bronze canopy designed by Bernini for St. Peter's Basilica weighs sixty tons.
The door plaque of "Wufang Pavilion" is hung in the main hall. In ancient China, the east, west, north, south, and middle were called the five directions, and the Tantric Buddhism of the Han Dynasty was dedicated to the five Buddhas, also known as the five wise Tathagatas. The meaning of the five-fang pavilion in the Summer Palace has nothing to do with the ancient directions or the five wise Tathagatas. It is taken from the concept of "mandala" in Tibetan Tantric Buddhism. Mandala means mandala in Sanskrit, and mandala flower is camellia, auspicious flower of Buddhism. It is said that when the Buddha held a mandala in his hand to preach the scriptures, he moved the mandala, and a rain of mandala petals would rain down from the sky, which represented good luck.
The courtyard of Wufang Pavilion is equivalent to a mandala. The copper pavilion in the middle is Mount Sumeru. The surrounding gate halls, east-west side halls and main halls symbolize Dongshengshenzhou, Nanzhanbuzhou, Xiniuhezhou and Beijuluzhou according to their orientation. Some people say that the five directions are "five directions colors", that is, the five colors of Dongqing, South Red, West White, North Black and Middle Yellow. The concept of five directions comes from "The Analects of Confucius" and was borrowed by Buddhism. In "The Analects of Confucius", there is "evil purple seizes Zhu Ye". In the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Huang Kan noted in "The Analects of Meaning" that "green, red, yellow, white, black, five square colors". Zhu is a positive color, and purple is a secondary color, which means one is good and one is evil. What Confucius said, "Zi seizes Zhuzhu" means that evil overwhelms righteousness.
There is a cast bronze door plaque of "Da Guangming Tibet" hanging on the copper pavilion, which is written by Qianlong. "Da Guang Zang" is a book that records the chances of Buddhist masters to realize the Dharma. It is a collection of stories about famous Buddhist masters becoming enlightened, compiled by Master Baotan in the Southern Song Dynasty. There is a pair of cast copper couplets hanging on the doorpost: the day of wisdom shines brightly to the dawn of thousands of worlds, and the cloud of kindness moistens the spring of all places. Huiri is my Buddha Tathagata, the thousand worlds are the world of Buddha's words;
If you go to this copper pavilion, you must not forget to take a closer look at the plaque hanging on the front of it. It is a cast copper Nine-Dragon Fighting plaque with the words "Baoyun Pavilion" in Manchu, Chinese, Tibetan and Mongolian. Before the thirteenth year of Shunzhi in the Qing Dynasty, the four languages of Manchu, Chinese, Tibetan and Mongolian were mostly used on the royal building plaques, and then they were changed to Manchu and Chinese bilingual. In the Qianlong Dynasty, it was extremely rare to still use Manchu, Chinese, Tibetan and Mongolian plaques, especially such Nine Dragons Fighting plaques are even rarer. I have seen Manchu, Han, Tibetan and Mongolian four-language plaques in the three major temples of Kulun. It was made of wood in the early Qing Dynasty, and it was probably newly remade. The plaque of Baoyun Pavilion was originally installed during the Qianlong period, which is very rare. I have also seen an original Manchu, Han, Tibetan and Mongolian four-language plaque in the Qianlong period, which is the plaque and square stone in front of the glazed archway in front of Zhao Temple in Xiangshan.
Which Buddha statues did Wufang Pavilion offer when it was in Qingyi Garden? I estimate that the main hall should be dedicated to the five Buddhas of Tantric Buddhism, that is, the Central Great Sun Tathagata, the Eastern Akari Buddha, the Western Amitabha Buddha, the Southern Baosheng Buddha and the Northern Bukong Achievement Buddha. The east side hall is dedicated to Manjusri Bodhisattva, and the west side hall is dedicated to Samantabhadra Bodhisattva, or the incarnations of these two Bodhisattvas. Baoyun Pavilion is the center of the mandala, and there should be a gilded bronze statue of Sakyamuni Buddha.
On the mountainside on both sides of Paiyun Hall, there are two buildings, Zhuanlunzang and Wufang Pavilion, both of which were ancillary buildings of the Great Baoen Yanshou Temple in the past. There are also two buildings at the foot of the mountain on both sides. On the east side is the current Jieshou Hall. I don't remember it ever being open for visits. Sitting north and facing south, it is surrounded by a whitewashed wall with leaky windows.
The main entrance is a vertical flower gate.
A wisteria trellis has been built in front of the gate in recent years.
This hanging flower gate looks like one hall, one voucher, that is, there is a circle of copying corridors in the courtyard.
Jieshou Hall was a Buddhist scripture building during the period of Qingyi Garden, called Cifu Building. Judging from the old paintings at the time, the outer wall is painted red, and the main entrance is a three-room pot door, pot window, gray tile and single eaves Xieshanding mountain gate. Such Humen and HuWindow mountain gates are rare now, and most of the temples in the Qing Dynasty in the city have arched doors and windows. The pot door and pot window can be seen in the Mingwang Hall of Jietai Temple in the west of Beijing, which is the mountain gate of Jietan Temple in Jietai Temple. Jieshou Hall used to be a two-story building with a front eaves corridor in the middle of the courtyard, which was the Cifu Building, with green glazed tiles and single eaves hanging from the top of the mountain. There are three apse behind the building. There is a platform corridor from the entrance to Cifu Building. There are many scripture cabinets in the Cifu Building, which store almost a thousand volumes of various scriptures. The scriptures stored in the Cifu Tower should be often read in the Dabaoen Yanshou Temple, and the scriptures stored in the Zhuanlun Zang on the mountain may be used for chanting in the temples on the mountain.
After Xianfeng's ten-year catastrophe, the Cifu Tower was completely destroyed. When it was rebuilt during the Guangxu period, because the Yanshou Temple had changed its purpose and there were no lamas chanting scriptures at the foot of the mountain, the Jieshou Hall was built on the ruins of the Cifu Building and was repurposed for other purposes. "Jie Shou" comes from the "Book of Songs", in which "July" reads "fire in July, clothing in September, jujube peeling in August, rice harvesting in October. For this spring wine, Jiemei Shou". When the rice is harvested, wine is made, and it will not be ripe until the next spring, which is spring wine. Referral: help too. The old man has long eyebrows, and his longevity is called Meishou.
Jieshou Hall was converted into a quadrangle courtyard with two entrances. In the front yard, there are five main rooms Jieshou Hall with two side rooms on one side, and five east and west wing rooms. There are also five main rooms with side rooms in the backyard, and three east and west wing rooms. There are eaves corridors in front of each house in the front and back yards, and the corridors in the courtyard connect the front eaves corridors of each house in the front and back yards. There are two very narrow small cross courtyards in the east and west of Jieshou hall, each with thirteen rooms facing east and west. Guangxu built Jieshou Hall, because of its two-entry courtyard layout, it is very suitable for accommodation. During the period of the Republic of China, Pu Xinyu, the grandson of Guizi Liu Yixin, lived in Jieshoutang for several years, and secretly moved to the east of the Strait as soon as the People's Republic of China was founded. Later, the government expropriated Jieshou Hall. Now, it is common for workers and officials to enter and exit the hanging flower gate, but no building materials are seen entering and exiting.
There is also a building under the Wufang Pavilion on the west side of the Paiyun Hall. During the Qingyi Garden period, this was the Arhat Hall. Judging from the old paintings at that time, the outer wall and main entrance are the same red walls and mountain gates as Cifu Building, and the mountain gate is also a pot door, pot window, gray tile and single eaves resting on the top of the mountain. There is an octagonal release pond in the yard first, and the Five Hundred Arhats Hall is just across the small stone bridge over the pond. This is a square hall in the shape of "Tian", which is quite large, seven rooms wide, with open doors on all sides, which are also pot doors. The second room, the second room and the last room are all floor-to-ceiling partition windows, which are called "floor-to-ground partition windows". On the top is the roof with bucket arches, beams and double eaves, with green glazed tiles and yellow trimmings. The cross in the middle of the word "Tian" is a single eaves top, and above the intersection is a double-eaves cross with a four-corner pavilion on the top of the mountain as a ridge brake. This kind of Arhat Hall is very classic. You can refer to the Arhat Hall of Biyun Temple in Xiangshan. Luohan Hall adopts this kind of floor plan for better lighting. There are windows at the front and back of each stroke of Tianzi, so that sunlight can come in and out freely. The five hundred arhat halls all over the country have almost the same layout, but most of them have single eaves and roofs.
They said that there are 500 statues of arhats in the Arhat Hall in Qingyi Garden. I wonder if there is Jigong, the legendary arhat appraiser who came late on the beam? It is said that these 500 arhats are like "fragrant face painting". The so-called fragrant face painting is to use incense ash to shape the image and then paint it with color. Of course, pure incense ash cannot be used, and other adhesives must be added, otherwise it will be difficult to shape and solidify. The technique of fragrant face painting is gone now, and modern techniques are used to establish new gods in new temples.
Five Hundred Arhats refers to the disciples of the Buddha before Nirvana, there are five hundred people. This "five hundred" is just a description, no one has actually counted it. These disciples are called monks, and they "beg for the Dharma from the Tathagata to practice the gods, and then beg for food from the lay people to serve themselves". Listen to the Tathagata teaching the Dharma every day, and then go out to seek food for alms. After the Buddha's Nirvana, the two great disciples, Kasyapa and Ananda, summoned five hundred monks to compile the Buddha's quotations into scriptures. There are different versions of Buddhist scriptures, that is, different disciples recorded different quotations from the Buddha. There is no record of five hundred arhats in Buddhist stories, but in Mahayana Buddhism of Han Dynasty, there are five hundred arhats with names and surnames sitting in the hall to enjoy incense and fruit offerings. So these five hundred arhats are the Chinese version of the Buddhist story.
There were sixteen arhats who were introduced to China from the Buddhist land according to the right path. At the end of the Tang Dynasty, two more were added to the Chinese Buddhist circle. Who were these two? There are different opinions. The additions to Tibetan tradition are Bodhidharma and Monk Budai. Damoduoluo is the layman of Fazeng and a native of Helan Mountain; Monk Budai was born in Fenghua at the end of Tang Dynasty, and is said to be the incarnation of Maitreya Buddha. In the Tianwang Hall of the temple, there is often a Buddha who is offered in the image of a cloth bag monk, which is the Maitreya Buddha who always smiles. Budai monks are very common, but Damodara is not. In the Hall of Heavenly Kings in Xihuang Temple in Beijing, there are two of them standing in front of one another. Behind Maitreya Buddha is not Wei Tuo but Damodara, which is extremely rare. The image of Damodara is holding a Zen stick in his right hand, a duster in his left hand, a small basket on his back, a canopy on his head, and tiger guards around him. The statue of Damodara in the Tianwang Hall of Huangsi Temple in Beijing is slightly different from this. Bodhidharma is not Bodhidharma. Bodhidharma is an Indian who came to China to preach and finally passed away in China. He is the first ancestor of Zen Buddhism in Chinese Buddhism.
The Hall of Five Hundred Arhats in Qingyi Garden was also destroyed in the catastrophe in the tenth year of Xianfeng. When it was rebuilt during the Guangxu period, it changed its use like Jieshou Hall, and it also became a two-entry courtyard, called Qinghuaxuan. If I can’t go to Jieshou Hall, I will just take a look at this Tsinghua Pavilion. Their layout and structure are the same.
There is also a whitewashed wall with leaky windows outside the Tsinghua Pavilion, and the main entrance is also a hall and a hanging flower door.
Look at its hanging flower gate tower, which was originally installed in the Qing Dynasty. Although it is no longer elegant, it still has charm.
The gate hall inside the vertical flower gate also has a screen door, which also connects with a circle of Chaoshou verandah in the courtyard.
Inside the gate is an octagonal pool with a white stone bridge on it.
This is the existing release pool in Luohan Hall of Qingyi Garden. There are white marble Zen stick handrails around the pool and on both sides of the bridge. There should be no such thing in the present Jieshou hall, because it used to be a library for storing scriptures.
After crossing the white stone bridge on the pool, the main house is directly opposite. Below the main building is a two-foot-high gray brick platform, which is only one brick higher than the Chaoshou verandah that runs through the whole courtyard. The main room is five rooms wide, with a hall door in the open room, sill walls and glass windows in the second room and a little room, and eaves corridors around it. There are two side rooms on each side of the main house, and the veranda goes around the side rooms to the backyard. The top of the main house is a beam-lifting structure, with a gray tile roll shed and a hard mountain top. The current main house has mottled paint and looks almost like the old house of the landlord. But if you look carefully, the red pillars, red doors and windows, and the square beams are covered with official Soviet-style paintings, all of which are royal style. Once the yard is overhauled, it will be magnificent.
Take a step forward and look at the couplets hanging in the Ming Dynasty.
A plaque of "Tsinghua Xuan" is hung under the eaves.
The word "Tsinghua" comes from the sentence "Jingzhan songbird collection, water and wood Zhan Qinghua" in Xie Hun's poem "You Xichi" in the Eastern Jin Dynasty. Zhan (reading) the sun is setting, Zhan is clear and transparent. Xie Hun is the grandson of Xie An, the Prime Minister of the Eastern Jin Dynasty who commanded the Battle of Feishui, and he is quite talented. The West Pool he mentioned was the royal garden in the west of the Imperial Palace in Health City (now Nanjing). There are couplets hanging on the pillars of the porch, "Plum blossoms in ancient spring, cypresses and leaves live long, clouds and clouds are colorful, mountains and rivers are clear and clear", and they are pictures of scenery and birthday. They are all inscribed by Cixi. The seal of "The Treasure of Empress Dowager Cixi's Royal Brush" on the plaque is very common, but the seal of "The Treasure of Empress Dowager Cixi's Royal Brush" on the couplet is rare.
The front yard buildings are arranged around the octagonal pool, which is very compact. On the left hand side of the main house are five east wing rooms.
The east wing room is exactly the same as the main room. They are five rooms wide, with open doors in the open room, a verandah in front, and a single eaves gray tile rolling shed with a beam-lifting structure and a hard mountain top. Because there is no ear room, the connection between the front eaves corridor of the east wing and the Chaoshou corridor is smoother and more pleasing to the eye. The base under the East Wing is as high as the main room, which is customary in folk houses, and the base of the main hall of the palace should be higher than the side hall and the corridor.
A pair of couplets hangs on the pillars in the open room of the East Wing, "surrounded by Xinlan and quiet bamboos, and chant the eternal wind and wind in the meeting day". "Shangyong" means raising a glass to drink wine and writing poems with a pen, which is a literati's activity. Cao Xiu's great-grandson Cao Yu (reading books) once wrote a poem "Praise the guests, raise the cup and chant Ruth". Bai Juyi called himself "Mr. Zuiyin", and he said in his autobiography that "in the three years since it was opened at that time, the husband had sixty-seven teeth, his beard was completely white, his hair was half bald, and his teeth were missing. However, the popularity of chant is still unabated." . The couplets in the East Wing Room are handwritten by Empress Dowager Cixi, with bamboo orchids and cup chant, which looks very emotional. In fact, there is no secluded bamboo orchid in this courtyard. If you say that Cixi is not as affectionate as Qianlong, Qianlong would plant two rows of bamboo when he was singing bamboo in Yulan Hall.
The east and west wing rooms sell things. It is now closed and ready for the overhaul of Qinghuaxuan.
To the west of the octagonal pool is the west wing, whose architectural form is exactly the same as that of the east wing, facing each other and mirroring each other.
There is also a pair of couplets hanging on the pillars in the Ming Dynasty, "Jade Yunzhu embraces the beauty of mountains and rivers, and Qiongzi Zhixiu shows the spirit of flowers and plants". The meaning of the first couplet comes from Zhu Xi in the Southern Song Dynasty, "Zhu Zangze is self-enchanting, and Yuyun Mountain contains brilliance", Yun: storage; Huai: Huai Zang. This is a poem about Zhu Xi's dissatisfaction with his talents when he was dormant after being dismissed from office. Qiongzi Zhixiu: Qiongzhi, Yuzhi, Xianfan, mortals eat to prolong life. The next couplet implies birthday wishes. The couplets in the East and West Wings show the orchids competing for beauty, and Cixi is applying Li Qingzhao's artistic conception of "the orchids are for longevity, and they reflect each other, and the hairpins are full of the courtyard. The flowers are soft and jade, and the cups are elegant". Imagining the scene of birthday celebrations in the Paiyun Temple, where the orchids shine, and the hairpins and wats gather in the Yingting Court, the wats are the officials, and the hairpins are the wives. She couldn't help but recall the coquettish, coquettish, womanly sourness when she raised her eyebrows and poured the king's wine in front of Emperor Xianfeng.
Go around the side rooms on both sides of the main room, and there is a courtyard behind. The chashou veranda in the front yard goes all the way to the back yard. There are also five main rooms in the back yard, with two side rooms in the east and west; the east and west wing rooms are smaller than the front yard, with only three rooms. Because there is no pool, the back yard must be more spacious than the front yard.
At the south end of the east and west wing rooms in the front yard, there is a small wall-mounted door on the veranda, which leads to the east and west small cross courtyard.
There are also East and West courtyards in the backyard, and there is also a relic of the Qianlong period in the East courtyard, which is the "Zunger Stele". It is said that this stele is in a stele pavilion, and that stele pavilion must not be the original one. The Zhungeer Stele is a lying stele, which is rare, and there are only two in royal buildings. One is in the Nanxun Hall of the Forbidden City, which was erected by Qianlong. It is called "Nanxun Hall Collection of Pictures" Wo Jie, which houses portraits of emperors and queens of all dynasties. Another one is the Jungar Monument. The existing lying steles in Beijing are all from the Qing Dynasty. Qianlong was not the first to create it. The first lying stele was erected by Shunzhi in the Pusheng Temple in the southeast corner of the imperial city. When Qianlong rebuilt Pusheng Temple, another lying monument was erected there. The Pusheng Temple was later changed to the European and American Scholars Association, and the two monuments were removed, and it is now the Wuta Temple behind the zoo. Look at those two steles, the Zhungeer Stele of Qinghuaxuan is similar to this lying stele.
On the top is the stele for the construction of the temple by Shunzhi, and on the bottom is the stele for the reconstruction of Qianlong.
The most famous inscription on the Tsinghuaxuan Zhungeer stele is Qianlong's Hongbian poem "The Master of the West". This poem is now in two places, one is on the stele here; the other is on the east wall of Yihexuan in Ningshou Palace in the Forbidden City. In the Kangxi Dynasty, there was a rebellion by Gerdan of the Zhungeer tribe, and the court rebelled and rebelled; Yongzheng rebelled and rebelled. In the 22nd year of Qianlong's reign, it was finally completely pacified and the Northwest issue was resolved, which lasted for more than 70 years. After the rebellion was over, Qianlong also accepted Yihuibu and Zhuo's daughter as concubine Rong, the legendary concubine Xiang. Concubine Rong's elder brother served as the court's internal response during the Qianlong suppression of the rebellion, and won a meritorious service and went to Beijing to serve as the Duke of Fu.
When Guangxu rebuilt the Summer Palace, he changed the Dabaoen Yanshou Temple into the Cloud Dispelling Hall, and changed the Arhat Hall supporting the Yanshou Temple into the Qinghua Pavilion supporting the Cloud Dispelling Hall. When there is a major event, Qinghuaxuan, like Jieshoutang, can be used as a guest house for guests from afar. Cixi did not plant bamboo orchids in Qinghuaxuan, but planted a few cloves. When viewing flowers in spring, all Beijing citizens come to see them.
You see this lilac blooms very happily, right? But if it is seen by Wanyue Pai Achou, he will definitely give birth to a heartbroken essay. Listen to this: Since returning to the Baihua Bridge. Then spend the night alone. The phoenix quilt and mandarin pillow, what's the matter? Even if there is a lingering fragrance, it is like Lang's love, which disappears day and night. I am afraid that if you don't believe in your face, you will be haggard and write frost. More with brocade characters, every word expresses love. To know the heart of sorrow, but look at the lilac tree, which is gradually ending its spring shoots.
Different from the Cifu Tower and Luohan Hall in the Qingyi Garden period, the Qinghua Pavilion and Jieshou Hall in the Summer Palace are completely consistent in architectural form and layout, and the east and west sides of the Paiyun Hall are symmetrical. Another difference from the period of Qingyi Garden is that the height of these two buildings has been reduced. The original Cifu Building in Jieshou Hall is a two-story building, and the original Luohan Hall in Qinghua Pavilion is also equivalent to a two-story building. Both buildings rise above the treetops. After the reconstruction of Guangxu, the two tall buildings disappeared, and the two buildings were submerged under the treetops.
When Guangxu was rebuilt, nine value rooms were built outside the east wall of Jieshou Hall, facing east and west, called Dongjiujianfang, which is now a fast food restaurant.
Symmetrically, nine warehouses were also built outside the west wall of Tsinghua Pavilion facing west, called Xijiujianfang. Xijiujianfang used to be a store, and later the Guishou Wuji Small Courtyard Tea House moved in.
The two nine-room buildings are exactly the same, symmetrical from east to west. There are three rooms in a group, with doors and steps open in the open room, and walls and windows in the second room. On the top is a hard mountain top with beams and gray tiles and single eaves. Its royal style is also reflected in the red pillars, red doors and windows, and the official Soviet-style paintings on the beams under the eaves.
During the period of Qingyi Garden, this area was full of Buddhist temple buildings. The lower floor of the middle road is the hall for chanting scriptures, and the upper floor is a tall Buddhist building. The east road is the treasure house of Buddhist scriptures. The Wufang Pavilion on the upper level of the West Road is a Buddhist altar, and the lower level is the Hall of Five Hundred Arhats. Major changes were made during the reconstruction during the Guangxu period. The temple halls on the lower level of the middle road were changed into palaces, and the lower levels of the east and west roads were changed into dormitories.
At this point, I have seen all the central buildings in the front of Longevity Mountain; I have also seen all the buildings connected by the promenade. The buildings in Qianshan are very imposing, and they are at the top level of Chinese classical garden architecture. It is not comparable to other gardens in the south of the Yangtze River, nor is it comparable to famous temples in other mountains. Even if the Old Summer Palace and Fragrant Hills do not have such momentum, the Old Summer Palace does not have such mountains, and Fragrant Hills does not have such water.
To see the scenery in front of the Longevity Hill in the Summer Palace, you must watch it from a long distance from the front.
There are mountains and water, and the mountain is in the shade of water, so you can sit on the mountain and face south to set up the scenery. The volume of the building in front of the mountain is full of Longevity Hill, breaking through the undulating contour of the mountain top. Especially the Foxiang Pavilion, together with the high platform, stands upright. The high platform is not empty either, there is a glazed handrail wall with a figure-of-eight ladder, and a rhombus pattern is drawn on the facade to fill it. There is also the coordination of the lines of the climbing corridors on both sides of the Dehui Hall. The buildings on the middle road are layered upwards from the Cloud Dispelling Hall, the bottom is the widest, and the upwards become narrower, and the last is the spire of the Foxiang Pavilion. It is a triangle, giving a sense of structural stability.
Going down from the platform of Foxiang Pavilion, the two sides spread out symmetrically. The Zhulun Zang and Wufang Pavilion buildings on the same level sit on both sides of the platform of the Foxiang Pavilion. Together, this is another big triangle outside of the middle triangle. If the Cifu Tower and Luohan Hall are still there, they are exposed from the treetops, that is to say, there is a Cifu Tower hidden under the runner on the East Road, which visually sits stably on the shore of the water. Wufang Pavilion on the West Road is also sitting on the shore of the water through the Arhat Hall. In this way, the middle road is straight up and down, and the east and west sides are slanted downward. This is the Wanshou Mountain Zhongshan formed by the scenery building, which is magnificent. The current Jieshou Hall and Tsinghua Pavilion do not appear in the front view of Longevity Hill at all, and the east and west roads below appear to have no foundation, lose the sense of geometric stability, and destroy the visual effect of Qingyi Garden.
In addition to the geometric contrast between the natural mountain and the man-made mountain, the warm tones of the red walls and golden tiles of the buildings on the front mountain form a strong color contrast with the cool tones of the Longevity Mountain and Kunming Lake in the background, highlighting the majesty of the buildings on the front mountain.
Therefore, if you want to fully appreciate the beauty of the scenery in front of the Summer Palace, you must not only walk into the halls, pavilions, pavilions and galleries, but also stand in the distance to see its general situation. Although the current Summer Palace is slightly lacking compared to the Qingyi Garden in the past, it is still the most imposing garden building in the world.
After watching the front bed and the back bed and the palace in front of the mountain, you can relax and wander around the small roads, and the depth and height will not waste your time.
(to be continued)
