Yuan Cishan Stele

Yuan Cishan Stele

The Yuan Cishan Stele is a cultural relic protection unit of Henan Province.

The Yuan Cishan Stele is located in the campus of the senior high school in Lushan County, Pingdingshan City. It is the tomb stele of Yuan Jie (719–772), a Tang Dynasty prefect and poet. The original inscription was erected at Yuan Jie’s burial site on Quanpo of Qingtiaoling Ridge, north of Lushan County. In the 42nd year of the Wanli era of the Ming Dynasty (1614), the stele was moved here and a protective pavilion was built. The pavilion is a square, pyramidal-roofed structure with gray tubular tiles, and the Yuan Cishan Stele is housed inside. This stele is a eulogy personally composed and inscribed by Yan Zhenqing, the great calligrapher of the Tang Dynasty, for his close friend Yuan Jie in the seventh year of the Dali era (772 AD) when Yan was 63 years old. The full text is written in regular script with characters about one and a half inches square. The strokes are bold, vigorous, graceful, and powerful, radiating an unyielding moral integrity. It is one of the representative works of Yan-style calligraphy. In 2006, it was designated as a National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit by the State Council.

The Yuan Cishan Stele is carved from bluestone, with its stele head missing. The main body is a rectangular prism, standing 1.9 meters tall, 0.95 meters wide, and 0.28 meters thick, with the lower right corner damaged. The inscription is carved on all four sides—also called a four-sided stele—with 17 lines on the front and back, and 4 lines on each side. Each line contains between 33 to 35 characters, totaling 1,383 characters. The first line reads: “Tomb Eulogy and Preface for the Late Yuan Jun, Former Prefect of Rongzhou, Concurrent Censor-in-Chief, and Regional Military Commissioner.” It describes Yuan Jie’s lineage, life achievements, and the date of his death and burial, expressing Yan Zhenqing’s admiration for Yuan Jie in multiple places. The text has been included in the Collected Works of Yan Lugong. Currently, most of the inscription remains intact, with 203 characters missing. The overall composition of the text is fluid and dynamic, making it a rare treasure of calligraphic art.

Yan Zhenqing was a master calligrapher of mid-Tang Dynasty China. He inherited the calligraphic tradition of Wang Xizhi from the Eastern Jin Dynasty and absorbed the artistic essence of the four great calligraphers of early Tang—Ouyang Xun, Yu Shinan, Chu Suiliang, and Xue Ji. He developed his own distinctive style in both regular and running scripts. The reason later generations regard Yan-style calligraphy as a model is largely because he broke away from previous norms, excelling in brushwork, structure, layout, and ink usage. His style stands apart, creating a uniquely outstanding approach. The calligraphic features of the Yuan Jie Stele include slender horizontal strokes and thicker vertical ones, predominantly using round strokes. Turns are made smoothly without sharp angles, with characters often featuring curved lines. Vertical strokes on both sides are bold, outwardly bowed, and inwardly embracing, with denser strokes on top and thicker ones below, forming distinctive “silkworm head and swallow tail” strokes—hallmarks of the mature Yan style. The text of the Yuan Cishan Stele is one of the works where Yan’s calligraphy reached its pinnacle and is widely regarded as a model for practicing Yan-style script.

In May 2006, the Yuan Cishan Stele, as a stone carving from the Tang Dynasty, was approved by the State Council for inclusion in the sixth group of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units.

Further Reading:

· First Group of Cultural Relics Protection Units of Henan Province

· Sixth Group of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units