108 tower of Qingtongxia

Qingtongxia 108 pagoda, one of the large Lama pagodas, is located on the West Bank of Qingtongxia reservoir, about 60 kilometers away from Yinchuan, the capital city. From top to bottom, press 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 There are 108 equilateral triangular towers, which are arranged in 12 odd layers, with a brick parapet in front of each tower and brick plastering on the ground.

The top one of the pagodas is large, 5 meters high, with a square base and a cave like Lama pagoda. There is a niche door on the east wall. 2-12 stories, 2.5-3 meters high, are solid Lama towers. There are octagonal or Asian shaped xumizuo on the plane of the tower base, on which the tower body is built, and the top of the brake is covered with phase wheel umbrella beads. The tower is divided into four types: the first layer is covered with a bowl, the second to fourth layers are octagonal shaped, the fifth to sixth layers are gourd shaped, and the seventh to twelfth layers are bottle shaped.

Buddhism believes that people have 108 kinds of troubles. In order to get rid of many troubles in life, they have to wear 108 beads and recite 108 sutras. The local people believe that as long as they worship the 108 pagoda, they can eliminate the troubles of life and get good luck.

One Hundred and Eight Towers

synonym

Qingtongxia 108 tower generally refers to 108 tower

108 pagoda, located in Qingtongxia City, Wuzhong, Ningxia, is a Lama style solid pagoda group built in the Xixia period. It is one of the largest and most orderly Lama pagoda groups in China, with a total area of 6980 square meters.

One hundred and eight towers are built along with the cutting of stones in the mountain. They are divided into twelve stepped platforms, which are raised from bottom to top. According to the mountain, they are arranged in twelve rows according to the odd number of 1, 3, 3, 5, 5, 7, 9 ·············, forming a huge tower group with triangular overall plane. There are 108 towers in total, which is named for the number of towers. It is a rare large-scale pagoda array in the world. It is famous for its unique architectural pattern, mysterious Xixia history and profound Buddhist culture.

In February 1963, 108 pagodas were announced as the first batch of key cultural relics protection units by Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region.

In 1988, it was announced as the third batch of national key cultural relics protection units by the State Council.

Historical evolution

108 tower was built in Xixia.

In the literature of Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty, 108 pagodas can be found clear records.

In 1648, there was a major maintenance of the pagodas.

During the period of the Republic of China, there were special maintenance. There were two small Lama pagodas under the Pagoda Forest. The two pagodas were composed of three parts: the base, the body and the Tasha. In addition, there was an ancient temple site under the pagoda.

In 1958, when the Qingtongxia reservoir was built, it was considered to build a barrage to submerge the lower reaches of the pagoda area. The ancient temple site and two pagodas under the Pagoda Forest were all demolished, and all 108 Lama pagodas were ready to be relocated. However, in the two pagodas that had been demolished, thousand Buddha pictures, silk paintings and Buddhist scriptures with Xixia characters were excavated, and the overall relocation plan was ended.

In 1963, when the state built the Qingtongxia Hydropower Station, it was considered to build a barrage to submerge the lower river beach of the tower area, and then the original ruins of an ancient temple and two brick pagodas were demolished.

Architectural features

building structure

The brick structure of 108 tower has only the outermost layer, which is wrapped by Adobe tower, with three sizes of 28 × 15 × 5 cm, 30 × 16 × 4 cm and 30 × 14 × 5 cm. All the adobe towers have a wooden column in the center. When it was repaired in 1987, all the adobe towers in the tower had been damaged. Some of the brick towers were plastered with lime mud outside, and some of them showed three layers of lime skin inside. Different patterns were painted with cinnabar and other pigments on different layers of lime skin. The outermost layer of some of the remaining towers was painted with "lotus petal pattern painted with cinnabar".

There are only one tower on the first floor of 108 tower, 19 towers on the twelfth floor, and 20 towers in total. Their bases are in the shape of cross folded angle and their bodies are in the shape of covered bowls. There are 23 towers from the second floor to the sixth floor, whose bases are in the shape of octagonal girdle xumizuo and their bodies are in the shape of gourds. There are 9 towers on the seventh floor, whose bases are in the shape of octagonal girdle xumizuo and their bodies are in the shape of cylinders. There are 56 towers from the eighth floor to the eleventh floor, The base of the tower is octagonal and the body of the tower is folded.

When the 108 tower was first built, the center of the tower was upright, with a vertical wood, adobe masonry and pastel outside. When the later generations rebuilt the adobe tower, they wrapped it with bricks and plastered it with mud and powder.

architectural style

The 108 Pagoda Forest was built along with the stone cutting and grading of the mountain. There are 12 steps of stepped slope protection platform, which gradually shrinks and rises from bottom to top. The overall shape is isosceles triangle. The first level platform is 5 meters high, 54 meters long and 5.67 meters wide. The total height from the first level slope protection platform to the twelfth level slope protection platform is 31.82 meters high and 59.1 meters wide.

The top one of the pagodas is large, 5 meters high, with a square base and a cave like Lama pagoda. There is a niche door on the east wall. 2-12 stories, 2.5-3 meters high, are solid Lama towers.

There are octagonal or Asian shaped xumizuo on the plane of the tower base, on which the tower body is built, and the top of the brake is covered with phase wheel umbrella beads.

The tower is divided into four types: the first layer is covered with a bowl, the second to fourth layers are octagonal shaped, the fifth to sixth layers are gourd shaped, and the seventh to twelfth layers are bottle shaped.

In 1987, the residual height was 5.04 meters, the diameter of the tower bottom was 3.08 meters, and there was a tower chamber. The other 107 towers were basically similar in size, all of them were solid towers, the residual height was between 2 and 2.5 meters, and the diameter of the tower bottom was between 1.9 and 2.1 meters. Half of the residual brick is used for the tower body, while the whole brick is used for the base.

Cultural relics

Thousand Buddhas

In 1962, in order to cooperate with the construction of Qingtongxia Hydropower Station, Ningxia Museum excavated and cleaned two small towers in the inundated area of the reservoir. There are two small covered pagodas on the beach below the 108 pagoda. Tower 1 is about 20 meters southeast of the pagoda group, and tower 2 is about 15 meters away from the middle of the pagoda group. In the base of tower No. 2, 20 cm above the ground, two painted silk Buddha paintings were found, each in a roll, sandwiched between wheat straw. The two pictures were seriously polluted and damaged in many places. The layout, size and mounting method of the two works are identical. One picture is clear, the other is vague. The main statue in the middle of the picture is the Tathagata Buddha and two Bodhisattvas. A few lines of Xixia Characters are written in ink in the lower right corner of the back of one painting, which is the earliest Xixia Characters unearthed in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region. Because the autonomous region has no conditions for restoration and preservation, the paintings were sent to the Palace Museum in Beijing for restoration and stored in the Palace Museum for a long time.

Painted Adobe

When the ancient pagoda was first built, most of the painted Adobe pagodas collapsed, some of them still had body and tower base, some of them only had tower base, and the top of the pagoda had collapsed. Most of these early Adobe pagodas are covered with three layers of lime mud. There are lotus petal patterns painted with cinnabar on the lime mud. Some of them have Sanskrit written in ink. Their shapes, colors and decorations are very similar to those of the earth pagodas from Xixia to Mengyuan period in Hexi area. They are also similar to those of the mountain behind the West pagoda when the double pagoda temple was renovated in 1999 The painted earth pagodas found on the slope are the same. These Fubo pagodas can be seen everywhere in Tibet, Qinghai, Gansu, Ejina Banner, Inner Mongolia, etc. they are the main architectural forms for the popularization of Tibetan Buddhism. When clearing the collapsed deposits of the towers before reinforcement and maintenance, the archaeologists excavated 8 brick Buddha statues, 4 painted clay statues, 1 painted clay lying elephant, 103 clay pagoda molds, 3 pottery pagoda brake roofs, and architectural remains such as Wadang and dragon head from the deposits of towers 001, 009, 017, 041 and 085.

Fragments of Xixia scriptures

On the north slope of Shanshui ditch, to the north of the towers, archaeologists found a brick tower. The upper part of the tower collapsed, leaving only a 30 cm high base with an octagonal plane. After cleaning up, a pottery bowl, more than ten clay tower molds and fragments of Xixia scriptures were excavated in the tower base. The Scriptures are rotten and conglutinated. After cleaning, we can see that there are two kinds of paper colors. One kind of paper has white color, many pages, rotten and conglutinated into a stack. This page has upper and lower margins. Inside the upper and lower margins of some pages, there is a horizontal row of sitting Buddhas. Between the upper and lower Buddha statues, there are Xixia characters printed. Each character is 2 cm square, and each vertical line has five characters. Another paper color yellow, only a remnant page. The remnant page is printed with Xixia Characters and the image of a lady and her attendants. This lady has a high bun, a flower hook and a beautiful face. She is wearing a long cross collar skirt with her hands folded in front of her chest and has a round head. There are three attendants behind the lady. The attendants on the right side are wearing Futou from the head and face Fangyi. She is older, wearing a round collar shirt and holding a long piece of utensils in her hands. The other two attendants only have their heads Under the base of the pagoda, silk books with inscriptions in Western Xia Dynasty were unearthed.

On the hillside to the north of the 108 tower, there is also a 30 cm high octagonal Lama brick tower foundation. The specific construction time is unknown.

protective measures

In 1982, Qingtongxia municipal government organized a warranty in the Cultural Bureau of the autonomous region, but the diseases that harmed the towers were not eradicated. In order to eradicate the hidden danger of the tower group and restore the stability of the tower group

Chinese PinYin : Qing Tong Xia Ta