Taicang Park

Taicang Park

Taicang park is located in Taicang City, Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province. The former site is "Haining Temple" in the Southern Song Dynasty, formerly known as "miaolian nunnery" in Liang Dynasty. It has a history of more than 1000 years. There are many cultural relics in the park, such as "wanghaifeng", a huashigang relic of the Song Dynasty, "tonghaiquan", a large-scale "iron cauldron" and "momiaoting" of the Yuan Dynasty.

There are three mountains (Xiyan, Dongyan and Zhongyan), one ridge, three Buddha Pavilion, five floors, three halls, four book rooms, one porch, ten pavilions, one repair Gallery, two stone bridges, six wooden bridges, five stone beams, four caves, four beaches and two class cups. The garden covers an area of more than 70 mu, with four tenths of earth and stone, three tenths of water, two tenths of rooms and two tenths of bamboo trees. Unfortunately, such a famous historical garden was destroyed in the early Qing Dynasty.

In order to inherit and develop the long-standing garden art, in 2003, the government invested in the reconstruction of Yanshan garden at the former site of Haining temple in Southern Song Dynasty according to the original drawings of Zhang Nanyang in Ming Dynasty.

Development history

Yanshan garden is the home of Wang Shizhen, a minister of criminal law and a writer in Nanjing in Ming Dynasty. It was initially called "xiaozhiyuan". Later, because there are "Yanzhou" and "Yanshan" in Zhuangzi, Shanhaijing and the biography of Mu Tianzi, they are fairyland. He called the garden "Yanshan people" and changed the name of the garden to "Yanshan garden" and "Yanshou garden". The back door is also listed as "Langya villa". Wang Shizhen thought that "the first residence is suitable for my body, but not for my ears and eyes, and planning must be the first garden", so he cooperated with Zhang Nanyang, a master gardener at that time, and built Yanshan garden in Taicang City, which is known as "the first garden in the Southeast".

Yanshan garden was rebuilt in 2003. Drawing on the creative idea of Taicang historical garden "Yanshan garden", we have built mountains and rivers in the garden, planted large trees, restored ancient buildings, and restored more than 20 scenic spots, such as "Yanshan hall", "Jiashu Pavilion", "nodding stone", "Fensheng Pavilion", "xiaofeihong" and "Jiuqu bridge". The area has also increased from 66 Mu to 110 mu. The old appearance has changed into a new one. It reproduces the beautiful scenery of "Yanshan garden" surrounded by green waves, pavilions and green trees. It has become an important tourist attraction to explore the ancient charm of Taicang.

Main attractions

In Taicang Park, the most valuable one is the momiao Pavilion. This pavilion is also introduced in Cihai (check the popular edition of Cihai in 1999). According to local records, the pavilion was originally located in huaiyun temple in the north of the city, which was built by Gu Xin, a military officer of Zhejiang Province in the Yuan Dynasty. Gu Xin had a close relationship with Zhao Mengfu, a great calligrapher of the Yuan Dynasty. He once worshipped Zhao as his teacher and devoted himself to calligraphy. When he resigned from office and returned to his hometown Taicang, Zhao Mengfu wrote two pieces of ink treasures for him, namely "going back to my hometown" and "sending Li Yuan back to Pangu preface". Gu Xinru got the most precious one, and when he returned to Taicang, he offered it to him by stone and built a pavilion, which was named momiaoting. In March 1983, it was moved here for reconstruction. On the back wall of the rebuilt momiao Pavilion, there are nine steles, such as Zhao Mengfu's GUI Qu Lai Ci, Chu suiliang's Ku Shu Fu and zhao shu's rebuilding Haining Chan temple, which are re engraved according to the rubbings of the Ming Dynasty.

There is also a story about the stele of GUI Qu Lai CI. It is said that Wei Zhongxian, the eunuch of Ming Dynasty, was in power. Mao Yilu, the governor of Suzhou, ordered Taicang to send zhao shu inscriptions to him in the mountain pond. The people of Taicang didn't want to send them away for nothing, but they were forced by his lewdness. Finally, under the discussion of Lu Yinglin, the local scholar, they came up with a way to break the stele and keep it. Because the stele was damaged, they were able to get rid of it preservation. In the Qing Dynasty, this monument was moved and embedded in the wall of Dacheng gate of Confucius Temple. During the cultural revolution, the broken steles disappeared. In the early 1980s, when the cultural relics were surveyed, it was found that one section was used as a washing stone plate, and the other as a pig pen pad, and survived. "Mo Miao Ting" in the pavilion was written by Zhu Qizhan, a master of Danqing in Benyi. The couplet written by Wang Junlu, a local senior official, was written by Fei Xini, the late famous calligrapher. The first couplet is "ink marks hang down the loushui River, long protect the new pavilion and look up to it together"; the second couplet is "wonderful traces pass on the gull waves, far treasures follow the high wind".

Jia is a famous water conservancy scientist in Wuzhong who was appreciated by Wang Anshi in the Northern Song Dynasty. In the fifth year of song Xining, he took the post of Si Nong Si Cheng. He was responsible for the construction of water conservancy in Zhejiang and Zhejiang provinces. He wrote Wumen water conservancy book and made great contributions to Wuzhong water conservancy. According to taicangzhou annals, "the tomb of Jiajia was built in the Song Dynasty, with a passage and gate, a pair of stone horses on both sides, and a special ancestral hall, which was abandoned later." In 1868, Kuai demou, the magistrate of the state of Tongzhi in the Qing Dynasty, rectified the tomb path, built the tomb gate, and rebuilt the ancestral Tomb of jiasinang temple. Then it was abandoned. The mound on the side of the tomb is the site of the original tomb, on which there are beech trees, boxwood, holly, old locust trees, sisal, jujube trees and so on. The tomb, built in August 1993, is surrounded by trees, pines and cypresses, quiet and solemn. There is a stone pavilion in front of the tomb. In the pavilion, the stele of the reconstructed jiasinang ancestral temple was erected when Kuai demou, governor of the state of Tongzhi, rectified the tomb path and built the tomb gate in 1868.

On the right side of Taicang park entrance, there is a temple site, namely Haining Temple site. In 2003, a large number of stone foundations, pillars and strips were found during the renovation of the park. There are exquisite carvings on the stones. Haining temple was built in 1130 A.D. in the fourth year of Jianyan of Song Dynasty. It was rebuilt in Yuan Dynasty and destroyed by fire in Xianfeng of Qing Dynasty. In the stele Gallery of Wang xijue's former residence in Taicang, there are also steles built in Haining temple. The site has been carefully cleaned up and well preserved. Now it has become a scenic spot in the park. The protection of Haining Temple site benefits from its location and the hard work of local cultural relics workers. However, some remote and inaccessible small-scale building sites can not get such "treatment", and the broken bricks and walls are scattered in the grass. We hope that in the future, we can follow the example of Haining Temple site to get better protection, and increase the regional historical and cultural content as much as possible.

Tourism information

Bus routes: 126, 109, 106

Self driving route:

Shanghai: Shanghai Jiaxing Expressway - Shenhai Expressway G15 - Taicang exit - Shanghai Road - turn right to Taiping South Road - turn left to Xianfu Street East Street - go straight to No. 40 Xianfu Street West

Suzhou: get off the Shuangfeng exit of Suzhou Kunming Taiyuan Expressway - Take National Highway 204 southward to the urban area - turn left at Xianfu street in the urban area and go eastward for 500 meters

Admission: Free

Opening hours: 7:30-17:00

Location: No.40 Xianfu West Street, Taicang City, Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province

Address: No.40, Xianfu West Street, Taicang City, Jiangsu Province

Longitude: 121.10118396413

Latitude: 31.446656602176

Tel: 0512-53103747

Ticket information: 20 yuan

Opening hours: 7:30-17:30