Hanging Temple

Accounts of the founding of the Hanging Temple differ: one dates it to 491, the fifteenth year of the Taihe era of the Northern Wei, and another to 398. It was first called the Xuankong Pavilion, and the name became Hanging Temple because the two words for dark and hanging sound alike and the buildings hang from a cliff. It was rebuilt under the Jin and Ming dynasties and in the Tongzhi years of the Qing, and most of what survives dates from the Ming and Qing. The complex has about forty rooms in a timber frame, with corridors and plank walkways joining the main buildings, and two three-story towers. In the Hall of the Three Teachings, in the north tower, Buddha, Confucius and Laozi are enshrined together. A major repair in 1978 replaced several main load-bearing beams and brought the hanging mortise-and-tenon structure to light again. It is a leading example of a timber building set against a cliff, and a special case among temples built to fit their terrain.^1,2,3,4

The builders set timber beams into the cliff. Twenty-seven wooden beams about 50 centimeters thick, soaked in tung oil, lie beneath the temple, each fixed at one end into the rock with mortise-and-tenon joints. Some carry the main buildings and project about one meter beyond them to hold the walkways. A dozen or so posts stand under the temple, but they are not the main load-bearing members. About forty rooms stand in a timber frame, joined by corridors and plank walkways, and the main hall has two levels on a base of cut stone blocks. Two three-story towers, each ten meters or more in height, have curled eaves under hip-and-gable roofs and rest on inserted beams, with several posts over ten meters long propping the outer side; one side is against the cliff and three hang in the air. Two walkways wide enough for one person link the towers: the upper one is planked and joins the third floors, and the lower one is cut into the cliff and joins the ground floors.^1,2,3,4