Paradise site

Paradise site

Tiantang site is located 155 meters northwest of Mingtang site, on the west side of the axis of the palace city. It is a square platform with five circular load-bearing foundations. It has a very unique shape. It is a Buddhist hall building built by Xue Huaiyi under the command of Wu Zetian to store Buddha statues.

Paradise in history

Heaven is an important palace in Luoyang City in Sui and Tang Dynasties. It is also Wu Zetian's Buddhist hall. Literature records: "at the beginning of Ming Tang Dynasty, the Empress Dowager ordered the monk Xue Huaiyi to make a large statue of Jia, with dozens of people in his little finger. He built a heaven in the north of Ming Tang to store it. It was destroyed by the wind, and even more so. Ten thousand people were forced to work every day to pick up Mu River Ridge. In a few years, the cost was trillions, and the government was exhausted. "

How high is heaven? Zizhitongjian gives a relatively specific description: Heaven is five stories high, and the third floor is higher than Mingtang. According to the existing literature, the height of Mingtang is about 90 meters, so the height of heaven should be at least 150 meters.

How high is the Buddha statue in heaven? What is the shape of Buddha in heaven? There is no specific description in the historical materials. However, according to "dozens of people are still allowed in its little finger", we can imagine that the height of this Buddha is extraordinary, which is estimated to be at least several times as high as that of Lushena Buddha in Longmen.

Unfortunately, in 695 ad, Xue Huaiyi, who was out of favor, set fire to this towering building, which is comparable to today's skyscrapers. From completion to burning down, its life span is only seven years.

The discovery of Tiantang site

Where are the ruins of heaven? It is about 150 meters northwest of Mingtang site. In 1977, in order to coordinate with the city's basic construction, Luoyang Museum (later divided into Luoyang Museum, Luoyang Ancient Art Museum and Luoyang cultural relics team) discovered a large circular building foundation site in the area east of Dingding road and south of Tanggong road. The foundation of the building is 11 meters in diameter, built with bluestone and two circles inside and outside. The bluestone used is about 1m thick, 1m-2m long and 0.7m wide.

Archaeologists later found a number of palace building sites in different periods from the late Sui Dynasty to the Song Dynasty, as well as a multi-layer circular column network centered on the circular building site. Looking at these, it's not hard to imagine how grand the buildings standing here were.

Excavation of Tiantang site

There are five periods of Tiantang ruins. The first (Sui to early Tang), the third (middle and late Tang), the fourth (late Tang and Five Dynasties) and the fifth (Northern Song) are composed of East-West walking corridor, east-west canal and partition wall. Only the second period (Wu Zhou period) is a large-scale building site Tiantang ruins.

There is only platform foundation left in the foundation site of heaven, which is connected with the West promenade of the palace city in the East, the East-West promenade room in the north, the brick apron in the West and the East-West promenade with a width of 4.33 meters to connect with other buildings in the West. The base is slightly square, 77.7 meters wide from north to South and 69.15 meters wide from east to west. The center of the platform foundation is a round stone pit, and there are two pillar foundations, one rammed earth foundation and one crushed stone foundation outside. There are 12 in the inner ring and 20 in the outer ring. The base stone is composed of four pieces of bluestone, and is composed of one layer of rammed earth and one layer of base stone. The rammed earth foundation is 5.35 meters wide, which is directly laid on the raw soil. Around the gravel foundation, it is a circular belt building foundation composed of residual stones, about 0.5m wide.

Aqueduct: East West trend, brick and stone from lime. On the north side of the platform base, it twists and turns to encircle the north of the platform base. The width of the canal is about 2 meters, the length of the North-South part is about 15 meters, and the length of the north-west part of the platform base is about 63 meters.

What is the new paradise like

What will "new heaven" look like?

This is a pagoda like protective exhibition building in Tang Dynasty style. In order to cooperate with the protection and exhibition project of the paradise site, the cultural relics department carried out archaeological excavation of the whole paradise site area. Archaeological excavation shows that the diameter of the rammed earth foundation of Tiantang site is nearly 70 meters.

Based on the description of heaven in the literature, the height of "new heaven" is adjusted to fit the reasonable height width ratio of the whole palace area. Based on this, the modern building designed by Guo Daimin, a doctoral supervisor of the school of architecture of Tsinghua University and a famous ancient architecture design expert in China, is as follows: on the site, a protective exhibition building with the appearance imitating the architectural style of the Tang Dynasty, the internal steel structure and the external decoration of red copper is built.

The "new paradise" has 5 floors in appearance and 9 floors in interior. The height of the building itself is nearly 60 meters. With two floors of platform and roof, the total height is about 80 meters. Specifically speaking, in addition to retaining the appearance of ancient buildings, the interior adopts modern architectural structure. Among them, the interior of the two-story platform foundation is the exhibition hall of heaven ruins. The indoor ground is glass floor or wooden plank road. Tourists can walk on the plank road to have a panoramic view of heaven and its surrounding scattered water, canals, column foundations, rammed earth foundations of gallery houses and other ruins. The interior of the main building is divided into several exhibition halls according to the floor. The relevant historical introduction, archaeological excavation and restoration research results of Luoyang City and Miyagi District in Sui and Tang Dynasties will be arranged. In addition to the traditional "model + exhibition board", 3D films, virtual roaming, holographic model projection and other modern digital means will also be used. In this way, the activities and related historical events of human beings in various historical periods in Luoyang will be expressed in a vivid way, and the original boring site exhibition will come alive.

After more than a year of intensive construction and decoration, the first, second and ninth floors of the paradise were opened on April 5 at the 31st Peony Fair. At that time, tourists can experience the flourishing Tang culture in close range.

The first level of Paradise -- site protection

The heaven ruins can be divided into five periods: Sui to early Tang, Wu Zhou, middle and late Tang, late Tang and Five Dynasties, and Northern Song. The heaven ruins of the second period, Wu Zhou, are protected under the glass floor.

From 1977 to 1979, some of them were excavated. The site is almost located on the central axis of Luoyang City in Sui and Tang Dynasties, adjacent to Mingtang hall in the southeast, 155 meters away. The two halls echo each other, forming the core building complex of the whole palace city. Now, in order to cooperate with the protection and exhibition project of Tiantang site, a comprehensive archaeological excavation of the site has been carried out from December 2008 to July 2010, and the shape, layout and evolution of the site have been basically clarified.

There is only the foundation part of the heaven architecture in Wu Zhou Dynasty, which is connected with the north-south and West Corridor in the central area of the palace city in the East, the East-West corridor in the north of the main hall of the palace city in the north, and the brick apron in the West. Through the indoor glass floor, we can see the true face of heaven and its surrounding scattered water, canals, column foundations, rammed earth foundations of the surrounding gallery houses and other sites. The diameter of the rammed earth foundation of Tiantang site is nearly 70 meters. The platform foundation is slightly square. There are five building foundations on the square platform foundation. From the inside to the outside, there are round pits built with bluestone walls, two-week pillar foundation stones, one-week rammed earth foundation and one-week gravel foundation. In addition, there are still bricks and loose water around the abutment. In the center of the Tiantang site is a huge pillar foundation pit, 14.8 meters in diameter, built with bluestone, two circles inside and outside. The bluestone used is about 1m thick, 1m-2m long and 0.7m wide.

The second level of heaven -- impression of heaven

On the second floor of the hall is a 22 meter long mural "the coming of all nations". It was created by the contemporary mural masters of the Central Academy of fine arts, such as Professor Wang Yingsheng and Professor Sun Jingbo. It will become a treasure handed down from generation to generation in the future.

According to the master plan of Paradise project and the design idea of Master Zhang Qiman, the main interior designer. The design concept of hall lighting highlights the theme of "phoenix". It reflects the characteristics of the times of peace, auspiciousness and harmony in the world, and shows the beautiful implication of phoenix flying together and a hundred birds facing the Phoenix. The crystal chandelier in the center of the lobby is dignified and full. The surface of the metal lamp holder is gold-plated. The Phoenix with a diameter of 3 meters in the center is cut out by wire cutting. It is inlaid with the world's top Swarovski light gold crystal pendant. Through the unique design and exquisite production technology, the lamp will become another work of art in the paradise project. Echoing the grand momentum of the lobby, it shows the noble temperament of "auspicious light and phoenix".

The ninth floor of heaven

The ninth floor is the holy Hall of heaven. It advocates to create a spiritual space for communication with human beings and Buddhists, and create a spectacular scene of the Western Paradise for devout Buddhists. This mural of the paradise just pushes this beautiful scene to the peak. In addition, the imperial palace of Sui and Tang Dynasties has a panoramic view of the temple of heaven. As a commanding height, it is a visual impact and a spiritual shock. Mingtang heaven echoes each other and strolls on the corridor. At this time, it seems that time flies back to the prosperous Tang Dynasty, back to Wuzhou, and interlaced with the empress's soul to experience the feat of Emperor Wu's "opening the Yuan Dynasty and ruling the grand Zhenguan".

The ruins park, with its magnificent scenes, revives the glory of that year. It describes the dignity and magnificence of the ruling center of the Tang Dynasty with incomparable emptiness. The protection and exhibition projects such as Ming Tang and heaven stand on the ruins. It tells the solemnity and magnificence of the political center of "a country with thousands of miles of mountains and rivers and nine gates of the city". Luoyang, the God capital witnessing the glorious history of China's feudal society

The first, second and ninth floors of heaven

Chinese PinYin : Tian Tang Yi Zhi