Beishan Grottoes Dazu
北山石窟 大足 重庆 · Beishan Dazu · Dazu Beishan
Tang to Southern Song·Late Tang to Song Sichuan Buddhist (Wei Junjing to Zhao Zhifeng line)·🇨🇳 Chongqing Municipality, Dazu District, Longgang Subdistrict, Beishan (North Mountain) 2 km north of Dazu town, China
About
About Beishan Grottoes Dazu
North mountain of the Dazu Rock Carvings (UNESCO 912), 2 km north of Dazu, with 290 niches and c.10000 statues (c.892–1162 CE Tang to Southern Song, peak Southern Song c.1127–1162): the most refined late Chinese Buddhist sculpture — slender-waisted Avalokiteshvara (Wheel of Dharma niche), 12-stage mother and child filial piety reliefs, and intricate secular scenes of music, chess, wine and domestic life. Unlike Baoding's (918) larger Baodingshan Great Buddha complex, Beishan is the scholar's rock-carving park: intimate moderate cliff (300 m long, 7–10 m high) with highest artistic finish, late Song literati patronage (Wei Junjing and others) and Confucian-Buddhist-Taoist triad niches.
Why it mattersMost refined Dazu niche gallery, Southern Song peak with Confucian-Buddhist secular genre, UNESCO 912.
Open questions
Mysteries & theories
Mysteries
- 01Southern Song vs Tang drapery diagnosis
- 02Filial piety iconography origin
Theories
- 01Song literati frontier Buddhist patronage
- 02Secularisation of Chinese grotto art at Dazu
Theories are interpretations, not findings. The seal above tells you how much scholarly weight the place carries.
History
How it came to be
- Built
- c.892–1162 CE (Tang 892 start, peak Southern Song 1127–62)
- Period
- Tang to Southern Song
- Culture
- Late Tang to Song Sichuan Buddhist (Wei Junjing to Zhao Zhifeng line)
- Builders
- Dazu frontier general Wei Junjing (Tang) then Song literati donors
- Purpose
- Essays in stone — filial piety and esoteric Buddhist teaching plus secular genre for Song frontier literati
- Rediscovered
- 892 Wei Junjing start; 1127 Song boom; 1978 UNESCO survey
- Excavation
- Excavated
892 CE
Wei Junjing founds Beishan with Fowan first niches
c.1140 CE
Southern Song Wheel of Dharma Avalokiteshvara masterpiece
1999
UNESCO inscription 912 Dazu
On the ground
Structures & features
29.7100° N · 105.7100° E · 425 m · 2 mapped features
Beishan — Wheel of Dharma Avalokiteshvara Niche (Niche 136)
niche statue2.1-m Avalokiteshvara with wheel attribute, slender Tang→Song masterpiece with openwork halo
29.7110° N · 105.7110° EBeishan — Filial Piety Relief Panel (Niche 155)
relief panel12-panel mother-child filial piety narrative in low relief, Song genre scene
29.7090° N · 105.7090° E
Gallery