Dazu Stone Carvings on Mount Baoding

The Dazu Stone Carvings are a series of Chinese religious sculptures and carvings, dating back as far as the 7th century A.D., depicting and influenced by Buddhist, Confucian and Taoist beliefs. Listed as a World Heritage Site, the Dazu Stone Carvings are made up of 75 protected sites containing some 50,000 statues, with over 100,000 Chinese characters forming inscriptions and epigraphs. The sites are located on the steep hillsides within Dazu County (near the city of Chongqing, China), with the high points being the carvings found on Mount Baoding and Mount Beishan. Dazu Stone Carvings on Mount Baoding, Dazu County, near Chongqing, China - Photo taken 25 December 2004 by User: Calton. ... Dazu Stone Carvings on Mount Baoding, Dazu County, near Chongqing, China - Photo taken 25 December 2004 by User: Calton. ... Jump to: navigation, search A replica of an ancient statue found among the ruins of a temple at Sarnath Buddhism is a philosophy based on the teachings of the Buddha, Siddhārtha Gautama, a prince of the Shakyas, whose lifetime is traditionally given as 566 to 486 BCE. It had... Jump to: navigation, search [edit] Confucius (traditionally September 28 551 BCE–479 BCE) was a famous thinker and social philosopher of China, whose teachings have deeply influenced East Asia for centuries. ... Jump to: navigation, search The Yin-Yang or Taiji diagram, often used as a symbol in Taoism. ... Jump to: navigation, search World Heritage Site #86: Memphis and its Necropolis, including the Pyramids of Giza (Egypt). ... Jump to: navigation, search Chongqing (Simplified Chinese: 重庆; Traditional Chinese: 重慶; pinyin: ; Wade-Giles: Chung-ching; Postal System Pinyin: Chungking) is the largest and most populous of the Peoples Republic of Chinas four provincial-level municipalities, and the only one in the less densely populated western half of...

The earliest carvings were begun in 650 A.D. during the early Tang Dynasty, but the main period of their creation began in the late 9th century, when Wei Junjing, Prefect of Changzhou, pioneered the carvings on Mount Beishan, and his example was followed after the collapse of the Tang Dynasty by local and gentry, monks and nuns, and ordinary people during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period (907-65). In the 12th century, during the Song Dynasty, a Buddhist monk named Zhao Zhifeng began work on the elaborate sculptures and carvings on Mount Baoding, dedicating 70 years of his life to the project. Jump to: navigation, search Also the name of a rock band. ... Changzhou (Chinese: 常州) is a prefecture-level city in the Jiang Nan region of the Jiangsu province of China, population up to 4 million. ... Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms (Traditional Chinese: 五代十國 Simplified Chinese: 五代十国 Hanyu pinyin: Wǔdàishíguó) (907-960) was a period of political upheaval in China, between the Tang Dynasty and Song Dynasty. ... Jump to: navigation, search The Song Dynasty (Chinese: 宋朝) was a ruling dynasty in China from 960-1279. ...

The carvings were listed as a World Heritage Site in 1999, citing "…their aesthetic quality, their rich diversity of subject matter, both secular and religious, and the light that they shed on everyday life in China during this period. They provide outstanding evidence of the harmonious synthesis of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism."

External link

• UNESCO World Heritage Centre page