Inner Mongolia Hohhot White Pagoda, China

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White Pagoda

The White Pagoda is located in the White Pagoda Village in east suburb of Hohhot of Inner Mongolia. It belongs to the old town of the Bafengzhou in Xiliao Dynasty. It is also called "the Hua-yan Sutra Pagoda" and is one of the famous eight scenic spots in Hohhot.

The White Pagoda has a pavilion style and mixed structure of brick and wood. It was built from 938 to 1030. As high as 54 meters, it has eight angles and seven floors. From down to up, it is narrower and narrower gradually, solemn and grand.

The pagoda seat is mostly underground and the upper appears lotus flower pieces. On the pagoda body there are full of the scriptures of the Hua-yan Sutra in Qidan language.

On the whole pagoda body and the pagoda angles there all hung aeolian bells, from up to down there are altogether 56 aeolian bells. When breeze blows, the aeolian bells will wave, bringing bell rings in a wavelike fashion like reciting scriptures, so melodious and pleasant to ear.

There are two semicircular archways on each floor and two square false square archways made of stone brick. The real archways intertwine the range with the false between each floor. On outer wall of the first and second floor there are the sculptures of Heaven King, warrior and Bodhisattva.

The sculptures are vivid and the lines are exquisite and they belong to the sculpture works of Liao Dynasty. On the archway facing south on the first floor there inlayed a stone horizontal inscribed board carved "the Hua-yan Sutra Pagoda" in Chinese.

Above the third floor, on both sides of all the stone doors and stone windows out of the pagoda body there are square pillars. On eight angles of the pagoda body there is a pillar. On two highest pillar there even carved dragon with arch carved patterns.

Inside the White Pagoda there are revolving stairs and multi-floor intertwining wooden beams. The stair intertwines up with wooden beams, very unique and full of ingenious and brilliant conceptions. Visitors can climb to the top of the pagoda and overlook the mountain and river and the landscapes of the Huanghe River are all under your eyes.

Inside the pagoda there are inscriptions of different years on each floor, from Jin Dynasty, Yuan Dynasty, Ming Dynasty and Qing Dynasty to now, some are even written at present.

Some inscriptions have very rich languages such as Chinese, Qi Dan language, Nu Zhen language, Wei Wuer language, Mongolian, Ba Si Ba language, ancient Syrian and ancient Bosi language, really letting people acclaim these works as the acme of perfection.

The White Pagoda is another outstanding works of Buddhist construction of Liao Dynasty people who believed in Buddhism for over one thousand years. In 1982 it was list into the emphatic preservation place in the whole China. It is also an important material to study Hohhot and history and culture in Liao Dynasty for modern people.

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