Cishi tower

Cishi tower

Cishi tower is located in the southwest of Dongting Lake. The tower is of brick and stone structure, pavilion style, octagonal seven stories, with a height of 39 meters. Pagoda towering, the male view of Dongting Lake, one of the "baling victory". This magnificent building embodies the artistic style of the Tang and Song dynasties. It's a pity that the tower is solid, so you can't climb on it and enjoy the scenery of Dongting.

Basic introduction

Cishi tower is located in the southwest of Dongting Lake. It is a brick and stone structure, pavilion style, octagonal seven storey, with a height of 39 meters. The base of the lower tower is paved with five layers of gneiss, and the body of the tower is all built with green bricks. From the second floor, there are 28 niches on all sides of each floor. The niches were originally used for small Buddha statues. Small bells are set at the eaves corner of each floor. The breeze blows and jingles. The top of the tower is equipped with an iron brake phase wheel, on which there are six iron chains running directly from the top of the tower to the tower base, which are used for stability and lightning protection. Pagoda towering, the male view of Dongting Lake, one of the "baling victory". This magnificent building embodies the artistic style of the Tang and Song dynasties. It's a pity that the tower is solid, so you can't climb on it and enjoy the scenery of Dongting.

Stories and legends

There is a moving story about the construction of the Cishi Tower: it is said that in ancient times, there were water demons in Dongting Lake, who often came out to harm the people and made them miserable. So everyone raised money to build a pagoda. Near the site of repairing the pagoda, there lived a family. The whole family was engulfed by the evil waves of the water demon, and there was only one widow, who was called CI Shi. She heard that she was going to build a pagoda to suppress demons. She donated all the money she had saved for many years, and she kept burning tea and water for the people who built the pagoda day and night. Unfortunately, she died before the tower was finished. In order to commemorate her, people named the pagoda Cishi pagoda and built Cishi Temple beside it.

Cultural history

According to the records of Baling county annals by Guangxu, during the Kaiyuan period of the Tang Dynasty (713-714 AD), a Buddhist named miaojiang from the western regions came to yuecishi tower and told his father that there was a white evil dragon running into this area in the west, which would cause trouble and harm the people for a long time, so it was necessary to build a tower to suppress it. It's said that there was a widow in the city, who donated money to build this pagoda with compassion in mind, so it's called the pagoda. But according to the textual research, the so-called "Ci Shi" does not refer to a widow, but refers to Maitreya in Buddhism. Buddha is based on compassion and sorrow. Maitreya means "Tzu Shi" in Sanskrit, so it is called Tzu Shi tower. Maitreya is worshipped in Cishi temple. According to Yueyang Fengtu Ji: "at the beginning of sunrise, Cishi tower reflects the heavy lake and the evil of Dongting water." This is the main purpose for people to build the Tsz tower, and also reflects a kind wish of the local people. After the construction of the pagoda, it was rebuilt in the Chunyou period of the Southern Song Dynasty. It has a history of more than 800 years. Although it has been destroyed by wind, rain, thunder and war, it still stands tall. Only the Buddha statue and the iron bell no longer exist. It is so solid that people can't help but admire it. In 1956, Cishi tower was listed as a key cultural relic protection unit in Hunan Province.

Historical evolution

When was the Cishi tower built? There are different opinions on chronicles, history and folklore.

Yueyang Fengtu Ji of the Song Dynasty says: "tujing: during the Kaiyuan period of the Tang Dynasty, miaojixiang, a Salmonella from the western regions, came here, which is called father and elder. The evil of the western white dragon has moved here now, but if it has been there for a long time, it will be in danger. It is appropriate to build a pagoda town. After several suffering from soil and water, people think of their words, then set up the tower. "At the beginning of sunrise, it reflects the heavy lake and the evil of Dongting water."

According to the records of Yuezhou Prefecture in Longqing of the Ming Dynasty, "Cishi pagoda was made by Jinmiao and Jixiang.". "After inspecting the Prefecture in the southwest of the county, there are seven levels of senior officials." "Zhang Ju, the magistrate of Hongzhi, destroyed the temple, and the pagoda remained."

According to the annals of Baling County of Guangxu in the Qing Dynasty, "Chunyou renyin menggong was rebuilt, and in the 35th year of Kangxi, the magistrate sun Shu was rebuilt."

So when was the Cishi tower built? Who built it? Why was it built? It has been a historical mystery for thousands of years.

First of all, I would like to say that the Cishi pagoda is a Buddhist pagoda. It does not have the same function as the Taoist "demon suppressing". Second, the Cishi pagoda originated from Qianming temple, and its merit lies in haojiangong. Third, the Cishi pagoda began in the Tang Dynasty and was built in the Five Dynasties. Therefore, the pagoda we see today is built in 1242 A.D., which has a history of nearly 800 years.

The origin of the theory of "Jin Jian". From ancient times to the early Republic of China, Yueyang City has been surrounded by water in the west, South and East. In the Jin Dynasty, the main peak of Tianyue mountain was 1500-2000 meters to the west of Tianyue mountain, which is now in Dongting Lake. According to legend, Dayu came to baling to plant cypress trees, which is the main peak of Tianyue mountain. Later, it was not until the first year of Zhongping, Emperor Lingdi, to the first year of Guangxi, Emperor Shaodi, that the temple was built according to the ancient cypresses.

In June of the third year of Long'an (399 AD), Emperor an of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the area of Dongting Lake was flooded with torrential flood, and the disaster of "three Zhangs of flat land" was very serious. At that time, from the second year of Xianning (276 A.D.) of Emperor Wu of the Western Jin Dynasty to the third year of Long'an (399 A.D.) of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, more than 80 large-scale floods occurred in the area of Dongting Lake, of which eight were the most serious. An Di was a very devout Buddhist, so he "wanted to make peace with the power of the Buddhist kingdom.". In June of the second year of Yuanxing (404 A.D.), Emperor an decided to ask empress Yong'an to take an imperial edict to baqianyuan Temple (today's Qianming Temple) to ask the abbot, master Tanyi, for his wish. At that time, the western region Salmonella wonderful auspicious (Dayue people, birth and death unknown) in Qianyuan temple. He put forward that "building a pagoda in accordance with the lake can not only bury the dead ancestors in the temple, but also pacify the evils of yunmengze." In the second year of Yixi reign (406 AD), Tanyi entrusted miaojiang to build the relic pagoda on the Bank of Dongting Lake in the southwest corner of Qianyuan Temple (now Qianming Temple).

Originally, the "pagoda" of Buddhism was transliterated from Sanskrit stupa (zudubo), which was called "tapa" and "tapo". Its main function was to bury and preserve the remains of monks. Although it was not a landmark building to commemorate a Grandmaster or engrave scriptures, it had no function of "suppressing demons". Later generations proposed that miaojiang should build the pagoda "to suppress the lake demon", which is obviously inconsistent with Buddhism and facts. At that time, "the height of the tower is no more than two Zhang, which is no entity.". Because the tower was built on the edge of the cliff, it was eroded by wind and waves for many years. Not only did the tower collapse, but most of the main peak of Tianyue mountain had been destroyed by lake waves. Therefore, although there is a basis for the "Jin Jian theory", the "relic tower" built by miaojiang is by no means the "Cishi tower" of today.

The reason of the theory of "Tang Jian". After Emperor Wu of the Western Jin Dynasty destroyed Wu in March of the first year of Taikang (AD 280), he divided Jun County into two parts, and built baling County in the West. Since then, baling has become a real city with administrative functions. (the former "Jin Tao Kan built a city in Baling" and the Three Kingdoms Wu Lu Su "Tun Ba Qiu built a residence" were all done by the military garrison, which had nothing to do with urban construction.) After that, baling city gradually became the administrative center of the state, government and county. In the Jin Dynasty, the government office of Baling city was located in the area of No.1 middle school and no.3517 factory. The city was square in east-west direction. The South Gate of the city is located in the north of the original Yueyang hotel. Outside the south gate, there are hills and wild mountains in the suburb, which are connected with Yonghu lake. There is only Qianming temple on the mountain. By the Tang Dynasty, the whole city could only move eastward because of the flushing of the lake water, and the shape of the city basically maintained the status quo, with only a slight expansion in scale.

In the third year of Tang Xianqing (658 AD), Emperor Gaozong issued an edict to change the name of Qianyuan Temple (today's Qianming Temple) in Baling to "Guangfu Temple" and wrote a plaque to the Emperor himself. After that, the silent mountain city in the south of the city suddenly became boiling. In order to commemorate this "holy virtue of the flourishing age", the Buddhist temple built a Buddhist building on the Bank of the lakeside in the southwest corner of the Buddhist temple with a large amount of wood, and worshipped "imperial plaques and imperial edicts" in the Buddhist building. "The foundation of the building is more than one hundred square arches (240 square arches are one mu), and it is more than eight Zhang (more than 20 meters) high, three layers of them.". Each floor has an ambulatory, the first and second floor has a Buddhist hall, and the imperial plaque and imperial edict are placed on the third floor. Because the building was built in the south of the main hall of the temple, monks in the temple called it "South Building". The place where this building was built is the foundation of the Cishi pagoda. Because this building is beside the Dongting and embraces the Yonghu lake, the scenery is excellent. After the completion of the building, it has always been a tourist attraction for literati.

More than 50 years after the building was built, that is, in the fourth year of Kaiyuan of Tang Dynasty (716 AD), the prime minister Zhang Shuo (known as "Zhang Yangong" from 667 ad to 730 AD) was demoted to Yuezhou as a governor. He often went to this building with Zhao Dongxi, Yin Mao and other scholars to enjoy the scenery of Dongting and Yonghu, and wrote a lot of poems. Two of them are directly related to "south tower". One is "Yueyang early Ji south tower", the other is "with Zhao Dongxi, Yin maozi both ascend south tower". At that time, after more than 50 years of wind and rain, the building had already lost its original style, so it had the feeling of Zhang Yangong that "the dangerous building empties the Dongting, and the water shines on the corner of the city". Later, some people mistook the "south tower" for today's Yueyang Tower, which obviously contradicts the historical facts. According to the annals of Baling County, "the south tower is located in the southeast of Baling county. Today's Nanjin leads to Gezi lake. Today's Yueyang Tower is not the South Tower of the past.". Since then, after more than a hundred years of wind and rain, "south tower" was naturally destroyed. Thus, although there was no Pagoda in Tang Dynasty, it was the rudiment of Cishi pagoda, which laid a solid foundation for the construction of pagoda in Qianming temple.

Jiangong built the tower. In the Five Dynasties, because the Zen master baling Haojian, the founder of the Qianming Dynasty, held that Yunmen was "an enlightened scholar under the three turns of language", he has been "famous since then". With more and more scholars coming to seek help, the scale of temples has been expanding, and baling city has become more and more famous with Haojian Zen master and temples. Because the temple is located in the Tianyue of baling

Chinese PinYin : Ci Shi Ta