Source: Beijing Evening News 23-7-17
The Dragon Wall-the zhaobi of buildings, is the first barrier in front of palaces, palaces, temples, houses and other buildings (zhaobi has multiple functions: protecting geomantic omen, repelling evil spirits, decorating and embellishing, showing identity, symbolizing wealth of power, and blocking the line of sight). According to the folklore circulating in Datong, after the founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang of the Ming Dynasty established the Ming Dynasty, his sons were enfeoffed as kings in the world, and the thirteenth son Zhu Gui was appointed as the generation king to guard Datong. However, Zhu Gui was not born to be a king, and he was ignorant and unpractical, and he was a dull urchin. After Zhu Gui, the acting king, came to Datong, he was overbearing and killed innocent people indiscriminately, making the people on the ground in Datong miserable, and the people complained bitterly. The wife of Zhu Gui, the acting king, is the daughter of Xu Da, a general of the Ming Dynasty, and looks ugly. Because of her ugliness, Mrs. Zhu is very jealous of the beauty of the maid, and often discredits her face and dresses, and the maids dare to speak out. The husband and wife were fooling around together, so they left a stigma in Datong, which has been passed down to this day.
After Zhu Gui became the acting king, he started building in Datong, and established the acting palace in Dadong Street in the same city. The Daiwangfu was grand and magnificent, with a royal style. Not satisfied with it, Zhu Gui built a nine-dragon wall in front of Daiwangfu.
According to the existing historical records, the Nine Dragon Wall is a single-sided colorful glazed wall, facing south, with a length of 45.5 meters, a height of 8 meters and a thickness of 2.2 meters. The Nine Dragon Wall consists of three parts. The lower part is the pedestal, also known as Sumeru, which is waist-shaped and 2.9 meters high. It consists of 75 glazed bricks, with two layers of glazed animals carved in relief, one is animals such as Kirin, lion, deer, horse, sheep, dog and rabbit, and the other is a small dragon. Animals and dragons are vivid, with different expressions and lifelike. The middle part is the main body of the Nine Dragon Wall, with a height of 3.72 meters. It is made of 426 pieces of glazed components and divided into six layers to form nine flying dragons. The upper part is decorated with a bucket arch, and the glazed tile beast rests on the mountain. At the east and west ends of the Kowloon Wall are the patterns of "Rising Sun" and "Bright Moon in the Sky" respectively. The center of the Nine Dragon Wall is facing the Wangfu, with a correct posture, the dragon head is upward, the dragon body is bent upward, and the main dragon of the Nine Dragon Wall is yellow, facing the gate of the Wangfu. The two dragons on the left and right of the main dragon are light yellow, with the dragon head facing east and the dragon tail swinging back to the central dragon, which is symmetrical. The two dragon taps which are symmetrical in turn are light yellow to the west. Then there are two symmetrical sapphire dragons, and the two outermost dragons (east and west) are yellow-green. The Kowloon Wall, with its teeth bared, is magnificent, as if it were falling from the sky, walking on clouds and rolling over the river. The background between Kowloon is a pattern of water plants and rocks, which sets off Kowloon as a subject and an individual, flexible and graceful.
A reflection pool is built in front of the Nine Dragon Wall, with a length of 34.9 meters, a width of 4.38 meters and a depth of .9 meters. A stone bridge is built in the middle of the reflection pool, surrounded by stone pillars, which are carved with various animal images in various postures. Whenever the light refracts in summer and autumn, nine dragons are reflected in the pool, and the water in the pool flows, and Kowloon swings its tail and flies, which is a great desire to go to the sky.
On behalf of Wang Zhugui, the Nine Dragons Wall was built, and its aesthetic and archaeological significance of observing ancient times is enduring for a long time. According to this, it is speculated that this person is not a dull generation. But why do folks say that Zhu Gui, the generation king, is obscene and hurts his wife? The public opinion that exists among the people pays more attention to the personal conduct of the officials and ignores other important cultural complexes. The original intention of Zhu Gui, the generation of Wang, to build the Nine Dragon Wall cannot be verified today, but what people are facing today is indeed a perfect Nine Dragon Wall and has become the transmitter of its culture.
Nearly 4 years after the Jiulong Wall in Datong stood in front of the Daiwangfu-the 21st year of Qianlong in Qing Dynasty (1755), the Jiulong Wall in Beihai, Beijing blocked the "True Meaning Gate" in Beihai (the True Meaning Gate was destroyed by a fire in 1919). It is said that Emperor Qianlong saw the Jiulong Wall in front of Daiwangfu in Datong, Shanxi, and then imitated it in Beihai. The Jiulong Wall in Beihai is 27 meters long, 6.5 meters high and 1.2 meters thick. The whole wall is inlaid with purple, green, yellow, blue, ochre and white colored glass, and there are nine dragons on both sides, flying in the sea of clouds and winding. Dragons are also decorated under the main ridge, vertical ridge, vertical, simple tile and colorful bucket arch of the Nine Dragon Wall, with 635 dragons of all sizes.
It is also said that the Nine Dragon Wall in Beihai was built by Li Guifei, the mother of Emperor Wanli of the Ming Dynasty. She believes in the Yellow Sect of Tibetan Buddhism (Tibetan Buddhism's Bonus Sect, Yellow Sect, White Sect and Flower Sect, which became the mainstream of Tibetan Buddhism after the reform of Zong Kaba, the master of Yellow Sect), and established the Great Western Scripture Field in Beihai to translate and print scriptures, and established the Nine Dragon Wall to curb Vulcan and prevent frequent fires. Its size records are also slightly different.
There is also a nine-dragon wall in front of the Imperial Palace in the Forbidden City in Beijing, which was built in the Qing Dynasty, with a length of 29.4m and a height of 3.5m..
Among the three existing glazed nine-dragon walls in China, Datong Nine-dragon Wall is famous for its earliest construction time and largest scale in the history of China. During the Chongzhen period of the Ming Dynasty, the palace in Datong was destroyed by fire. According to the Qing Dynasty's Datong Mansion Records, "imperial academy, the capital of western Liaoning, was in Fuheyang Street. In the eighth year of Ming Hongwu, it was built here, and in the twenty-ninth year, it was changed to the Dai (Wang) Mansion. Wu Zongxing was stationed in Datong. At the end of Chongzhen, it was destroyed by the fire of soldiers. Today, there is a yellow glass with a dragon pattern on it, which the natives call the Nine Dragon Wall. " In the Qing dynasty, there was a poem about the Nine Dragons Wall: "The glazed wall shines on Kowloon, and it is in a trance." The biography is the palace before the Ming Dynasty, and the scale is as straight as that of the emperor. Yun Jin is a great craftsman, and Tao Kun is a straight kiln worker. The temple pavilion has been robbed of ashes, leaving this wall to the east of the street. "