Yingxian Wooden Pagoda—A millennium legacy, a building that moves

The Yingxian Wooden Pagoda, located within the Fogong Temple in Yingxian, Shuozhou. It was built over a period of 22 years from the fourth year of the Xingxi era (1035) to the second year of the Qingning era (1056) during the Liao Dynasty, and Emperor Daozong of Liao bestowed the name 'Sakyamuni Pagoda'. The wooden pagoda is the tallest and oldest existing all-wooden pagoda-style building in the world, and it is known as one of the 'Three Wonders of the World' alongside Italy's Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Eiffel Tower in Paris. It is said that the famous architect Mr. Liang Sicheng personally measured the dimensions of the Yingxian Wooden Pagoda: it stands 67.31 meters tall, with a diameter of 30.27 meters at the base, and a total weight of 7,430 tons. The pagoda consists of three parts: the base, the body, and the steeple, with the base further divided into upper and lower levels—the lower level being square and the upper octagonal. The body of the pagoda is octagonal, with five visible stories and six eaves, but in reality, it has five bright and four dark stories, totaling nine stories. The ingenuity of the wooden pagoda also lies in its dynamic characteristics; due to its combination of rigid and flexible architectural structures, the 24 outer columns can adjust their load-bearing capacity in response to changes in the Earth's crust, giving it the ability to move flexibly and avoid disasters on its own. Throughout the course of history, the development of different religions, cultures, and ethnicities often carries traces of civilization's integration, rather than existing in isolation. As a Buddhist structure from the Liao Dynasty, the Yingxian Wooden Pagoda incorporates many elements of Taoism in its design and construction. Standing in front of the pagoda, one can clearly see that the orientation of the wooden pagoda completely corresponds with the pre-heaven Bagua diagram. Moreover, the pagoda does not use a traditional square structure but instead an octagonal frame, which enhances the stability of the building. This also aligns with the Taoist pursuit of harmony and balance. What we can also see is that the architecture of the Liao Dynasty abandoned the soft and delicate beauty of the Song Dynasty architecture of the same period, choosing instead to inherit the grandeur and passionate exuberance of the architecture of the prosperous Tang Dynasty, thus highlighting the rugged and majestic characteristics of the architecture of the northern Liao Dynasty, presenting a completely different style from the Holy Mother Hall of Jinci in Taiyuan under the Northern Song Dynasty, 230 kilometers away. Within the five actual stories of the wooden pagoda, there are exquisite colored sculptures of Buddha. The style of the sculptures is very similar to those in the Baoji Teaching Hall of Huayan Temple in Datong, built in the seventh year of the Chongxi era (1038) of the Liao Dynasty, with vivid shapes, robust figures (which is completely different from the pursuit of delicate and clear features in the later Yungang Grottoes), and dignified faces. Although the interior sculptures have been weathered over a millennium and repaired and repainted over the generations, they still retain the original appearance of the Liao Dynasty sculptures. For example, the image of Sakyamuni in the first-floor hall has green beards and eyebrows, which is related to the Khitan men's practice of growing beards. Every era has its unique culture. Up to the present, there are eight major wooden structures from the Liao Dynasty still in existence, namely the Guanyin Pavilion, the Dule Temple Gate, the Sakyamuni Pagoda, the Fengguo Temple, the Daxiong Hall, the Baoji Teaching Hall of Huayan Temple, the Kaishan Temple, and the Ge Yuan Temple. Mr. Liang Sicheng named them the 'Eight Great Liao Constructions'. A thousand years have passed, the Liao regime has long been extinguished, and the Khitan people have disappeared without a trace, but the porcelain they left behind, the buildings, the culture, and their stories are still here, telling future generations that they were once here.