Dazu Rock Carvings

The Dazu carvings run to tens of thousands of figures cut into cliffs at more than seventy sites between the ninth and thirteenth centuries, and they are unlike the earlier Buddhist caves of northern China in that they are late, largely Song, still carrying original paint, and above all narrative: the great curve at Baoding Mountain reads as a continuous illustrated sermon, with scenes of hell, of parental kindness, of the perils of drink, and a reclining Buddha thirty-one metres long. Confucian and Daoist figures appear alongside Buddhist ones. Beishan, closer to town, holds finer smaller work in niches along a cliff.

History

The earliest carvings were begun in 650, early in the Tang dynasty, but the main period began in the late 9th century, when Wei Junjing, prefect of Changzhou, started the carvings on Mount Beishan, and local gentry, monks, nuns and ordinary people followed his example in the Five Dynasties period. In the 12th century, under the Song, the monk Zhao Zhifeng began the great sculptures of Mount Baoding and gave 70 years of his life to them; the carvings were opened to Chinese visitors in 1961 and to foreign visitors in 1980, and became a World Heritage Site in 1999 (Wikipedia, Dazu Rock Carvings).

Highlights

• Baoding Mountain - a curved cliff of narrative scenes with original colour.
• The reclining Buddha - a thirty-one-metre figure cut into the rock.
• The hell and virtue scenes - moral narratives in stone, unusually vivid.
• Beishan - refined smaller niches along a separate cliff.

When to go

March to May and September to November; Chongqing summers are famously hot and the cliffs offer little shade. Baoding and Beishan are separate sites needing a full day together.

Before you go

Sites are spread apart and separately ticketed, needing transport between them. Some figures are weathered or restored. English interpretation is limited given the narrative complexity.

Nearby

Chongqing lies east; Chengdu is northwest.

Key facts