The world’s largest iron Buddha head

Located in the southwestern corner of the city, Dayun temple, ordered by Wu Zetian(The only female emperor in Chinese history), was built during the Zhenguan period of the Tang dynasty. It was rebuilt in the 54th year of the reign of emperor kangxi (1715) due to an earthquake. In 690, the empress dowager received a copy of religious book named Dayun and became obsessed with Buddhism. Soon she ask the whole country to build Dayun temples. Today, there are only three Dayun temples in China. The Dayun temple in linfen is well preserved because it has long been the site of the museum of linfen city. In 2006, Dayun temple was announced as the national key cultural relic protection unit. The scale of dayun temple is not large. The main existing buildings includes the gate, the hall, jinding glass pagoda, sutra house. Liang Sicheng, a famous chinese architect, once commented in The History of Chinese Architecture saying that this tower was unprecedented in the past. Shanxi as one of the birthplace of coloured glaze, its coloured glaze firing technology has a unique style. Since ancient times there goes a saying that “Shanxi coloured glaze all over the China”.

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There are 58 colorful coloured glaze buddhist patterns in the tower of Dayun temple with bright luster and vivid characters. There is a hollow inside most of the stupas in the Tang and Song dynastie. The hollow inside Dayun temple is a square room. When we open the tower door, we can see the face of the Buddha head which is around 6.8 meters high and 5.8 meters wide.The surface of the head was originally pasted with a layer of white ash for painting and gold. Hollow inside, used for placing sutras and town temple treasures. According to the textual research, the head of the iron Buddha should be the original work of the tang dynasty, with a total weight of more than 15 tons, ranking first in the world. According to expert analysis, casting such a large work with pig iron is extremely difficult. It is worth mentioning that the body with the giant head should be at least 40 meters long, and the whereabouts of the body is still a mystery.

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Post time: Apr-03-2020
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