Ancient temples hidden deep in the mountains, visit the most exquisite thousand-year-old wooden structures south of the Yangtze River!

There are not many things that can be preserved for a thousand years, and there are only a few wooden structures. What is the concept of a thousand years? A thousand years ago was the fourth year of Tianxi of Emperor Zhenzong of the Northern Song Dynasty, when Song and Liao were agreed to be a brotherly state, warfare was suspended and the economic and social development of the Song Dynasty flourished, becoming one of the most peaceful and happy periods in the history of Chinese feudal dynasties. In the midst of the southern mountains, an imposing temple has been rebuilt. Probably no one expected that this exquisite wooden structure, which has escaped natural and man-made disasters and the smoke of war, would still be standing a thousand years later, becoming one of the few thousand-year-old wooden structures south of the Yangtze River in China, and one of the most exquisite.
This temple is the Ningbo Baoguo Temple, which is currently a pure attraction, with no incense or Buddha statues. If you are burning incense and worshipping Buddha, there is no need to visit Baoguo Temple. If you are interested in Chinese culture and ancient architecture, Baoguo Temple is a must-see.

When I arrived in front of the Baoguo Temple, the rain suddenly stopped and the sunshine came in between the verdant trees, a wonderful start to a visit to an ancient temple in the mountains after the rain.

As of today, China has announced 8 batches of 5058 national key cultural relics protection units, and Baoguo Temple is one of the first batches of 180 announced in 1961, which shows its weight of it.

When I entered the scenic spot, I felt that the negative oxygen ions were bursting, the sun was not dry, the breeze was just right, and the forest was full of birdsong and flowers.

Picking up the steps, full of new greenery and fresh air, looking forward to meeting a thousand-year-old building.

Alongside the trail is the "Linglong Spring", an ancient temple in the deep mountains and a giant tree with a sweet spring.

Breathing in the fragrant air with plants and looking at the fresh greenery, even if there is no thousand-year-old building, the 20 yuan entrance fee is well worth it.

After a ten-minute climb, the first thing you see is the mountain gate, which reads "The First Mountain in the East".

A Chinese field dog greets the guests in front of the gate, which is just like Li Bai's visit to the hermits in Dai Tian Shan, "The dog barked at the water, and the peach blossoms were thick with dew". But this worldly dog did not bark and walked away without panic.

When you walk through the gate, you will see that the plaque hanging "Baoguo Temple" is not the main hall, but the Hall of Heavenly Kings, which was rebuilt in the third year of Qing Dynasty.

In front of the Hall of Heavenly Kings, there are two scripture buildings from the Tang Dynasty, the eastern one was built in 839 and the western one was built in 854, which is also a must-see point of Baoguo Temple.

In 1983, three halls of the Ming Dynasty were moved into the temple, and in 1984, two scripture buildings of the Tang Dynasty were moved into the temple, so now the temple has become a group of buildings of various periods, such as the Tang, Song, Ming, Qing and Republican Dynasties.

After the Hall of Heavenly Kings, there is a pure earth pool, which is the only building relics of the Southern Song Dynasty in the temple, according to the temple record pool length of four feet eight feet, two feet two feet wide, ten feet deep. The existing object is 13 meters long and 6 meters wide, and the Pure Land Pond is located in an important position in the central axis.

The building after the Pure Land Pond is the essence of Baoguo Temple, the Daxiongbao Hall, which was rebuilt in the sixth year of the Xiangfu Period of the Northern Song Dynasty (1013).

The plaque outside the hall reads "The Ancient Temple is reborn" and the plaque inside the hall reads "Jingjin Yuan". In 1064, 51 years after the completion of the hall, the imperial court gave the plaque "Jingjinwon" to the temple, taking the words of the Immeasurable Life Sutra, "Be fierce and diligent, and have no earnestness of purpose".

When you enter the main hall, although the light is rather dull, it cannot conceal the radiance of the ancient Chinese wooden structure from a thousand years ago.

The Hall of Treasures is majestic, with a rare combination of melon prismatic pillars and huge arch, clever articulation, precise mortise and tenon, which firmly binds the building's components together without a single nail, and holds the weight of more than 50 tons on the roof of the entire hall, standing for a thousand years without falling down.

The four sections of the four prismatic pillars are the earliest examples in China, which are not only material-saving but also beautiful, a rare structure among the existing ancient wooden buildings.

Some people say that the Baoguo Temple is a "beamless temple" because the beams are not visible when you look up, but in fact, the hall has beams.

The beams of the hall are covered by the ceiling and the algae wells, which are not easily seen from below.

Picture In addition to the wonder of the thousand-year wooden structure, the Baoguo Temple is also known for its "no birds, no insects, no dust".

In fact, in addition to the most geographical location of the Baoguo Temple, rich vegetation, few exposed surfaces, not much dust, another most important reason is because of the Baoguo Temple peculiar architectural design.

If you look up at the upper level of the main hall, you will find many light and ventilation openings on the top, which creates a chic "breezeway" - the air from the outside enters the "breezeway" and then The air from outside enters the "duct" and forms a cyclonic airflow, which keeps rotating in the hall of the temple, thus giving the beams of the hall an uninterrupted cleaning.

The "birds do not perch, insects do not enter" is said to be related to the wood used in the temple, it is said that the wood used in the temple for the yellow hinoki, this wood hardwood, fine texture, the age of the tree can even reach two thousand years, and contains a pungent fragrance, the smell of birds, insects and mosquitoes are afraid to approach. In addition, the special structure of the main hall and the wind flow of acoustic vibration also expels the birds and flies.

There was no Buddha statue in the hall, no incense, and even few tourists, so I sat quietly in a corner and felt the thousand-year-old Chinese culture, which felt so good.

After the main hall is the Great Compassion Pavilion, which is an exhibition hall where you can learn about the past and present life of Baoguo Temple.

Although the Baoguo Temple has been around for a thousand years, the experience of actually discovering and dating the temple is not that far away. In the summer of 1954, Qi Deyao, then a student at Nanjing Engineering College, and his classmates Dou Xuezhi and Fang Changyuan formed an internship team to investigate the homes and ancient buildings around Hangzhou, Shaoxing and Ningbo.

Towards the end of the survey, they overheard someone say that there was a long-established "Hall without Beams" in the mountain north of Hongtang. So, they decided to go up to Ling Mountain to find out.

At that time, the sky was not beautiful and it was raining heavily. The three men went ahead in the rain to find the ancient temple, they carefully examined the hall to create, from the arch, algae well, melon prismatic column and other details they had never seen parts analysis, concluded that this building is unusual. But it was too late for mapping and photography, and after the rain stopped, the three of them took the last bus back to Ningbo.

The next day they rushed back to Nanjing and reported this important situation to their teacher, Professor Liu Dunzhen, a famous architect and academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. Professor Liu Dunzhen was so amazed that he asked them to return to the temple, and the three of them lived and ate at the Baoguo Temple for 20 days, conducting exhaustive mapping, photography and data collection.

In 1957, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage invited Professor Liu Dunzhen to nominate ancient buildings in Suzhou, Zhejiang and Anhui provinces for the first list of national key cultural heritage protection units. Professor Liu Dunzhen recommended the Baoguo Temple.

On March 4, 1961, the Baoguo Temple, together with the Fo Guang Temple, was included in the first batch of national key cultural relics protection units as one of the few surviving early wooden structures in China, becoming the first "national protection" in Ningbo, because it represents the highest level of ancient Chinese architecture and has the significance of a "specimen" in the history of architectural development. "national protection".
Ninety years after the completion of the Baoguo Temple, the official Northern Song Dynasty promulgated the architectural design and construction of the specification book "Build the French", which was the encyclopedia of construction technology at the time and influenced the history of Chinese architecture for nearly a thousand years, while the wood technology of the main hall was mentioned in the same way as the "Build the French", and even some became isolated examples.
In fact, the Baoguo Temple is not only one big hall, but also a group of ancient buildings with different periods of architecture such as Han Dynasty (Phyllis Well), Tang Dynasty (Scripture Building), Song Dynasty (Hall without Beams), Ming Dynasty (Yingxiao Building), Qing Dynasty (Tianwang Hall, Guanyin Hall, Bell Tower, Drum Tower), and Republic of China (Hidden Scripture Building). What is Chinese culture, the thousand-year-old Baoguo Temple is the touchable and visible Chinese culture, what is cultural confidence, the ancestors built wooden buildings standing for thousands of years is cultural confidence. Baoguo Temple is one of the treasures of Chinese ancient architecture.