Liaocheng Small Prayer Mosque

Liaocheng Small Prayer Mosque

Liaocheng Small Prayer Mosque is a cultural relic protection unit of Liaocheng City.

Liaocheng Small Prayer Mosque is located on Xiaolijiaosi Street, north of Loudong Street in Dongchangfu District, Liaocheng City, and is now a key cultural relic protection unit of Liaocheng City.

The Small Prayer Mosque was first built during the Ming Dynasty and has a history of over 700 years. The mosque faces east and covers an area of 2,400 square meters. Its overall layout employs traditional Chinese design techniques to form several enclosed courtyards, adorned with flowers, plants, and rockeries, which enhance the beauty of the mosque environment. The architectural composition is well-organized with clear primary and secondary structures, harmonious and symmetrical, strictly following Islamic ritual systems, and the design concept is very ingenious.

The main gate of the prayer mosque faces east, and above the gate hall hangs a large plaque with the golden Chinese characters "Qingzhen Si" (Mosque) on a red background. Upon entering the gate, there is a courtyard, with a bathing room on the south side, which is a place for Muslims to perform ritual ablutions before religious activities.

The prayer hall is five bays wide and consists of two parts: the front hall and the rear hall. The front part features a single-eave flush gable roof with a rolled shed porch, while the rear part has a double-eave hip-and-gable roof. The two roofs are connected. Inside the main hall, above the door between the front and rear sections, there is a horizontal plaque inscribed with the Arabic word "Bismillah." The central back wall is fully adorned with Arabic scripture latticework and a wooden plaque inscribed with the "Hundred Words Eulogy."

Outside the southern wall of the prayer hall is a moon-viewing pavilion. In front of the pavilion, the courtyard has a flower bed, and to the south of the courtyard stands a Ming Dynasty seven-beam, three-bay nanmu wood hall, known as the "Old Hall," also called the Hall of Sincerity. To the south of the Old Hall is a courtyard with an ancient well, beside which there is a flower bed. To the west of the Old Hall is an attached lower room, with round doors on the north and south sides leading to the second courtyard. The second courtyard has long been destroyed.