Mount Baoding Buddhist Sculptures

Longevity Pavilion at the Baodingshan Cliff Carvings.

Baodingshan (simplified Chinese: 宝顶山; traditional Chinese: 寶頂山; also known as Mount Baoding, Precious Summit Mountain, and Summit of Treasures) is a Buddhist site in Chongqing. The site is located on a limestone outcropping at an elevation of 500 meters, fifteen kilometers north of the center of Dazu District, a market town that dates to 758 CE and the city is ringed by religious sites dating from 892 to 1249 CE.[1] Primary construction at Baodingshan took place during the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279 CE) but it remained largely unknown to the outside world until its reopening to the public in the 1980s, the earliest documented research on the site dating to 1944.[2] The site has since been designated a World Heritage Site since 1999, falling within the collective grouping of Dazu Rock Carvings, a reference to the district in which Baodingshan is located.[3] Dazu County covers 1400 square kilometers northwest of Chongqing on the road to Chengdu. During the Song dynasty (960–1279 CE), this area of the Chengdu plain was considered one of the wealthiest regions in China.[4]

  1. ^ Dazu xian zhi: Sichuan sheng (Dazu Gazetteer: Sichuan Province). Taipei: Chengwen chuban she. 1976.
  2. ^ Yang, Jialuo (1968). The Discovery (1945) of 6216 Statues Carved on Rocks During the T'ang and Sung Dynasties at Ta Tsu. Taipei: Encyclopedia Sinica.
  3. ^ "Dazu Rock Carvings". UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Retrieved 10 February 2016.
  4. ^ Lo, Winston W. (1982). Szechwan in Sung China: A Case Study in the Political Integration of the Chinese Empire. Taipei: University of Chinese Culture Press. p. 11.