Drive around Pingshun County, Shanxi Province, China.
In the hinterland of Taihang Mountain at the junction of Shanxi, Henan and Hebei provinces, there is a beautiful river valley that you may have never heard of, and since you know it today, you must take a walk, it is the valley of the Zhuozhang River.
On both sides of the river valley, there are eight national key cultural relics protection units, they are: Tiantai Nunnery, Yuanqi Temple, Dayun Temple, Buddha Head Temple, Chunhua Temple, Huilong Temple, Xia Yu Shrine and Longmen Temple, what are the preciousness of these?Let's take a look at it today.
The S324 Provincial Highway accompanying the Zhuozhang River is not only an important freight passage connecting the east and west sides of Taihang Mountain, but also one of the most beautiful highways that must be driven in this life. This section of the road, the mountains on both sides of the river valley are undulating, steep and precipitous, change the scenery step by step, the cultural relics and historic sites preserved at the foot of the mountain, the ancient villages and ancient dwellings are innumerable, and the national cultural relics protection units alone, whether it is the quantity or the quality, will make those cities in the developed areas of the eastern coastal areas who can only fake the ancient buildings covet and envy.
National Treasure Buddha Head Temple
A corner of the Buddha Head Temple.
Fotou Temple, located in Chedang Village, Yanggao Township, Pingshun County, Shanxi Province, is not far from another national treasure, Chunhua Temple in Yanggao Village. Buddha Head Temple is a folk temple, simple and low-key, the founding age is unknown, its name ** in the backing of the green mountain Buddha, the mountain is like the Buddha, solemn and majestic.
The Chedang Village where the Fotou Temple is located is surrounded by mountains and rivers, surrounded by peaks and mountains, deep canyons, and beautiful scenery. The cultural relics and historic sites in the village are everywhere, in addition to the Buddha Head Temple, there are many ancient dwellings, as well as the Yuan Dynasty's Guanma Temple, the Ming Dynasty's Quanshen Temple, the Pox Temple, the Qing Dynasty Yaowang Temple and many other temples, entering the village, as if entering the wooden structure ancient building museum.
Fotou Temple "Twenty-four Heavens" mural.
The existing cultural relics of Fotou Temple are mainly the main hall of the Song Dynasty building (some people believe that it is the Yuan and Ming Dynasty buildings) and the "Twenty-four Heavens" murals in the hall at the end of the Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty.
The main hall of the Buddha head temple is the top of the nine ridges of the rest mountain, the face is wide and three, in the early years, it was used as the warehouse of the production team, and the Buddha statue in the hall does not exist. The murals in the hall were also plastered with mud until September 2010, when the local restoration work was carried out, and they were stripped from the inner wall.
Chunhua Temple, a national treasure
Chunhua Temple is located in Yanggao Village, was built in the Northern Qi Tianbao period, Northern Song Dynasty Taizong Zhao Guangyi Chunhua two years (991) changed to the current name. If it weren't for the map and admiration, who would have thought that this small temple full of distiller's lees and bean dregs on the flat ground around it would be a Jin Dynasty building that has stood for a hundred years.
The only remaining nave of Chunhua Temple, the volume is much smaller than the Buddha Head Temple next door, the single eaves nine ridges rest on the top of the mountain, the eaves are far away, the eaves angle is high, the bucket arch is concise, the curve is beautiful, small and exquisite. In front of the hall stand two sutra buildings in the early years of the Northern Song Dynasty, which are engraved with the Sutra of Zun Shengdharani and the Sutra of Vajra Prajnaparamita.
Chunhua Temple's "Four Short People".
One of the highlights of Chunhua Temple is the four dolls on the roof, it is said that these four villains are called "four short people", referring to: Zhou Yu, Bai Qi, Han Xin, Wang Bodang.
There is also a theory that these four are: Gongsun Zidu (a beautiful man of Zheng Guo in the Spring and Autumn Period, the grandson of Zheng Huan), Pang Juan, Zhou Yu and Luo Cheng.
Regardless of who they refer to, these historical figures have been used as negative teaching materials, and their common characteristic is that they do not live long.
There is only one hall left in Huilong Temple.
From Chunhua Temple, continue downstream along the Zhuozhang River valley for about three kilometers to Houbi Village, where there are two national treasures, the Jin Dynasty Hall of Huilong Temple and the Yuan Dynasty Hall of Xia Yu Shrine.
Huilong Temple has been a timber warehouse in the village until 2001, teachers and students from the School of Archaeology and Museums of Peking University came here to carry out surveying and mapping Xi of ancient buildings, and stumbled upon the fact that this little-known Buddhist temple building is very old, and after surveying and mapping, it was confirmed that this is a building from the late Song Dynasty to the early Jin Dynasty.
Unlike most Buddhist temple murals with Buddhist scriptures, the murals in the main hall of Huilong Temple are mainly based on the story of "Journey to the West", and there is a mural that tells the origin of the name of Huilong Temple, and it is a bizarre story that I don't know who wrote.
It is said that at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, Wang Mang chased and killed Liu Xiu to the turbidity of the Zhanghe River, and there was no way forward for the pursuers, Liu Xiu saw an old woman not far away, so he dismounted and asked her for help. The old man asked Liu Xiu and others to hide in the woods, and took out the bee candy to write down the words "Wang Mang should die, Liu Xiu should be happy", the bee candy was soon crawling with ants, Wang Mang came to see it, thinking that it was the will of heaven to die Mang, and was immediately scared away. Liu Xiu was saved and thanked the old man for his kindness.
Later, in order to commemorate Liu Xiu, people built a temple here and named it "Huilong Temple", probably looking forward to Liu Xiu coming back again and repaying the grace of saving his life.
After reading this story, I thought to myself, how can anyone believe such a ghostly story?It's outrageous.
Xia Yu Shrine. The highest place of the village above the Huilong Temple, there is a "Xia Yu Shrine" to commemorate Xia Yu's water control, people borrow the sacrifice to Dayu, look forward to the turbidity of the Zhang River no longer flooding, the wind and rain are smooth, less disasters and less difficulties. The scale of Xia Yu Shrine is not large, occupying a mountain, only entering the courtyard. It's a pity that the door is closed every day, and there is no contact**.
Travel map of the historic sites of the Zhangzhang River Valley.
Shanxi Changzhi cultural relics and monuments travel map.