Jinan, these must-see attractions such as "Simen Pagoda" and "Lingyan Temple"! Have you ever been there?

Simen Pagoda and Lingyan Temple are both heavyweight cultural relics with high value. It takes one and a half hours to get to Ximen Tower by bus from the city center.

The oldest existing single-story stone pagoda in China.

Simen Pagoda: The oldest existing single-story stone pagoda in China. Named after the semi-circular arch on all sides, there is a stone pillar in the center of the tower and a Buddha statue of the Eastern Wei Dynasty on all sides. One of the Buddha statues was stolen in 1997, which was a major cultural relic case with bad influence in that year. Although the Buddha's head was discovered after several changes of hands in 2002 and finally returned to its original position, there is no way to recover the loss.

Simen Pagoda is an affiliated building of the original Shentong Temple, with the royal background of Sui Dynasty, and it is the great temple of Sui and Tang Dynasties. Although the main body of the temple has been destroyed, there are still many cultural relics around it. Not far from the mountain, there is a small Song Pagoda. There are rivers and trees beside the village, and the scenery is beautiful. Opposite the mountain stream, there is a spectacular Tallinn. Although its scale is much smaller than that of Lingyan Temple in Jinan, there is no fence around it, so you can watch the carvings on the stone pagoda at close range. The sculpture in the main hall in the Tang Dynasty is exquisite, and it still maintains its original appearance. Moreover, behind this seemingly dull mountain gate is the national treasure cultural relic "Loumen".

The famous Lingyan Temple

The scale of Lingyan Temple scenic spot is also very large. If the weather is fine, you can climb this mountain (a corner of Mount Tai) to see the famous Lingyan. It's just that there are not many buildings in the temple, and the volume is not very large. We can only see the past glory from the ruins of many temples. In the Tang Dynasty, Li Jifu, Lingyan Temple, Tiantai National Temple in Zhejiang, qixia temple in Nanjing, Jiangsu and yuquan temple in Jiangling, Hubei were also called "four wonders in the region". The temple is located in a valley surrounded by mountains, surrounded by lush forests and isolated from the outside world.

The most famous cultural relic of Lingyan Temple is 40 painted arhats in the Song Dynasty, which can be called a "miracle" in the Thousand Buddhas Hall. Liang Qichao called it the first plastic sculpture at sea. After thousands of years, these lifelike clay buddhas still exude amazing charm.

To put it more vividly, give some details: many arhats can see tiny blue veins on their hands, and because some arhats are fat and some are thin, the blue veins on their hands are also prominent and hidden! Another detail is the painted clothes on Lohan's body, which are also as small as matchheads. Judging from these paintings, the monks in the Song Dynasty were particularly gorgeous and bright.

Unfortunately, due to too long time, more than half of the painting has fallen off. None of these 40 arhats have similar faces, and they are all as magical as living people.

In addition to the painted Luohan in the Song Dynasty, another important attraction of Lingyan Temple is the Tomb Pagoda Forest. It is the second largest tomb pagoda forest after Shaolin Temple in Songshan Mountain. However, unlike the brick pagodas in Shaolin Temple, the pagodas in Lingyan Temple are made of stone. When it rains, the tower of the Hundred Pagodas is drenched in black and shiny, full of vicissitudes and gloom.

Many tomb pagodas are not tall, but they look like three or four meters at most, but there is no uniform style in the shape of a large dense layer, which can be round, single layer or several layers. The tour guide said that the size of the tower does not depend on the master's cultivation level, but on the economic situation of the temple at that time.

Tallinn is surrounded by railings in two parts. At the end of the road, there are two large square pagodas, both of which are square single-story pavilion stone pagodas, which are very similar in style to the four-door pagodas.

Other attractions of Lingyan Temple

Other attractions of Lingyan Temple include Bizhi Pagoda, Yushu Pavilion and Wuhua Pavilion, among which Bizhi Pagoda was built in the Tang Dynasty and rebuilt in the Northern Song Dynasty, which is the only pavilion-style ancient pagoda in China. Its shape is strange and its tower is different. The first to third floors are double eaves, and the fourth to ninth floors are single eaves. As a pavilion-style building structure with dense eaves, Pishi Building is unique in China, which may be an example of a pavilion-style building with dense eaves.