001 Architecture Kaiyuan Temple, Quanzhou Huang Shougong made it a condition that he would give up his estate only when the mulberry trees bore lotus blossoms; days later, white lotuses covered the trees. Two centuries later, the Buddha hall, the sutra library, and the bell tower burned down in a single night. Thereafter Kaiyuan Temple was rebuilt again and again: wooden pagodas gave way to brick, and brick to stone, until a knife-bearing “Monkey Pilgrim” was carved onto the Renshou Pagoda—some three hundred years before the hundred-chapter Journey to the West. Later still, famine crowds filled the long galleries, and Ming-dynasty visitors circled the twin pagodas beneath the moon. Tang dynasty Licheng District, Quanzhou, Fujian Province Kaiyuan Temple, Quanzhou · Lotus Flower Temple · Xingjiao Temple →
002 Architecture Hualin Temple In the second year of the Qiande era of the Northern Song (964), Bao Xiurang, an official of the Wuyue Kingdom serving as commandery governor of Fuzhou, founded the Yueshan Jixiang Chan Cloister on the ruined site of the old city at the southern foot of today's Mount Pingshan, praying for peace within the realm. The celebrated Southern Song minister Zhang Jun once lodged at the temple during his exile in Fuzhou; in the twentieth century the surviving main hall escaped demolition by being used as a warehouse, and was ultimately preserved through survey, dismantling, and relocation. Northern Song Dynasty Fuzhou, Fujian Province Main Hall of Hualin Temple · Hualin Temple · Yueshan Jixiang Chan Cloister →