North Grand Mosque

North Grand Mosque

The North Grand Mosque is a cultural tourism attraction.

North Grand Mosque

The North Mosque, located in the northeastern corner of the city and southwest of the Iron Pagoda, is commonly known as the North Grand Mosque and also called the Iron Pagoda Mosque. The exact date of its establishment is unknown. Originally situated outside the North Gate, the mosque was damaged during a Yellow River flood in the late Ming Dynasty. It was relocated to its current site in the early Qing Dynasty.

Legend has it that when relocating the mosque, a clan ancestral hall belonging to a certain family was purchased from Guide (present-day Shangqiu), and materials from it were used to build the mosque. While most buildings in Kaifeng typically feature public pillars and mother beams, this mosque’s structure uses public beams and mother pillars, which is one of its distinctive features.

The mosque complex includes a three-bay main gate facing west, with wing rooms on both the north and south sides inside the gate. There is also a three-bay main prayer hall, fronted by a covered porch. Above the corner gates on the north and south sides of the porch are stone inscriptions. The northern inscription is a five-character seal script reading “Dragon Horse Carrying the Diagram,” with a seventeen-character regular script signature below: “In the third month of the second year of Jiayou (1057), Bao Zheng, Academician of the Dragon Diagram Pavilion and Prefect of Kaifeng.” The southern side has an equally sized and similarly made stone inscription, a running script note by Heshen in the fifty-second year of Qianlong (1787), recounting how Jiang Lan, the Provincial Administration Commissioner of Henan, unearthed a stone inscription written by Bao Zheng in 1785 at the foot of Heigangkou Dyke, sent a rubbing as a gift, and documented the excavation process. Modern scholars have verified that the “Dragon Horse Carrying the Diagram” site should be along the banks of the Yellow and Luo Rivers, and that the Heigangkou area, where the Yellow River flows today, was not part of the river’s course in the Song Dynasty. Furthermore, Bao Zheng’s official title at the time should have been “Acting Prefect of Kaifeng, Direct Academician of the Dragon Diagram Pavilion,” and Jiang Lan’s account of the excavation is considered absurd and obviously fabricated. However, these two stone inscriptions were noted in later records to have once been part of a shrine and pavilion built during the Qianlong era, though it is unclear when they were embedded in the North Grand Mosque.

The mosque also houses a stone stele from the twentieth year of the Daoguang era (1840). The front of the stele is inscribed with the “Record of Liu Family’s Donation for the Mosque School,” while the back and upper part of the front feature Arabic Quranic verses. Together with the Arabic stele at the East Grand Mosque, they are regarded as a pair of precious Islamic inscriptions in the city.

The area in front of the mosque was originally a main street. At the time, the area behind the auditorium of Henan University was largely composed of streets, such as Qinglong Street and Huilong Street, which gradually fell into disuse. Nowadays, the area south of the mosque is occupied by the residential compound of Henan University faculty. Some of the Hui people who originally lived around the mosque have moved elsewhere, while others have relocated near the main street. However, religious activities have continued uninterrupted. The mosque houses a stele erected by Imam Yang during the Daoguang era. According to local worshippers, there were 45 imams before him. Based on community recollections, 17 more imams served after Imam Yang. This long history offers a glimpse into the mosque’s enduring legacy.