Rear Hall of Dinghui Temple in Fengrun

Rear Hall of Dinghui Temple in Fengrun

The Rear Hall of Dinghui Temple in Fengrun is a cultural relic protection unit of Hebei Province.

Dinghui Temple, commonly known as "Huan Yuan Temple," is situated on a high terrace to the east of Xiyouguo Temple Village, approximately 10 kilometers northwest of Fengrun District. Its eastern and northern sides are near the foothills, while its western and southern sides are more than 200 meters away from a lowland area, with a height difference of nearly ten meters. This gives the temple an open, lofty, and prominent setting. According to the "Fengrun County Annals": "Twenty li to the north of the county lies the ancient Dinghui Temple. It is surrounded by mountain ranges and lush with trees." "Its common name, Huan Yuan Temple, comes from the monk Huan Yuan." The temple was first built during the Tianhui era of the Jin Dynasty (1123–1137), originally covering an area of 18 mu (approximately 1.2 hectares) with a width of 80 meters from east to west and 145 meters from north to south. It was a grand Buddhist monastery. Dinghui Temple faces south with its back to the north, and along its central north-south axis are arranged the Front Hall (Mountain Gate), Middle Hall, and Rear Hall. On both sides of the central axis are side rooms and the Bell and Drum Towers. The Front Hall houses statues of the two guardian deity generals Heng and Ha; the Middle Hall features statues of the Four Heavenly Kings treading on eight demons; and the Rear Hall has two copper Buddha halls on its eastern and western sides, containing nearly a thousand uniquely shaped copper Buddhas. In the northwest corner of the Rear Hall stands a thirteen-story pagoda named "Huan Yuan Pagoda," built in honor of the renowned monk Huan Yuan. Beside the pagoda is an octagonal stele pavilion inscribed with the life and merits of Monk Huan Yuan.

Having withstood centuries of vicissitudes, Dinghui Temple was renovated during the Wanli era of the Ming Dynasty. However, most of its structures were destroyed during the Cultural Revolution in 1966, leaving only the Rear Hall intact today.

The walls of the main hall are constructed with strip bricks. The exterior uses a fine white lime pointing technique with staggered cross joints, while the interior employs a one-stretcher-one-header bond. On the outer lower section of both gable walls, there is one hanging column on each side above the shoulder level, with four vertically arranged carved bricks inside. Each brick features a different flower design, and above the floral carvings are half-rectangular continuous leaf patterns.

The hall’s painted decoration is of a mixed style. The architrave features a dragon head band with a “two dragons playing with a pearl” central medallion. Below the ridge beam, the central panels contain four boxes decorated with golden phoenix designs, while the flat beam heads are adorned with peony patterns and the central panels feature intricate golden decorative motifs.

The surviving wooden structure of the Rear Hall of Dinghui Temple still retains characteristics of the early Ming Dynasty, blended with some folk construction techniques, forming a unique style. The Rear Hall holds significant value for the preservation of ancient architecture and was designated as a provincial-level cultural relic protection unit by the People's Government of Hebei Province in 1982.

The Rear Hall faces south and is situated in the northern part of Dinghui Temple. It is a single-eave, tile-roofed hip-and-gable roof structure. The hall is three bays wide and three bays deep, with a porch added to the north side of the central bay. This porch was built during the Qing Dynasty’s Guangxu era to protect the Buddha statues from rain splashing in. The overall width of the Rear Hall is 12.66 meters (measured from the center of the east and west corner columns), and its depth is 9.34 meters (measured from the center of the front and rear eave columns). The porch is 4.9 meters wide and 1.83 meters deep. The eave columns of the Rear Hall are 4.10 meters high, about 4/5 the width of the central bay, with an aspect ratio of 1:11. The roof pitch ratio is 1:16.

The wooden structure of the Rear Hall consists of four-rafter beams with front and rear breast rafters. The vertical components include ??, accompanying ??, spacer blocks, and spacer beams, totaling four elements. The hall uses a total of 16 pillars (4 corner pillars, 4 eave pillars, 4 gable pillars, and 4 gold pillars). The corner pillars have a slight incline of 2% of their height, only in the east-west direction. Connecting beams are installed between the gold pillars and eave pillars.

The Rear Hall’s architrave supports 136 bracket sets in the six-purlin style, including 4 at the corners, 124 in the spandrels, and 8 at the column tops. Each bracket set features projecting arms, with components arranged from bottom to top as follows: ang (bracket arm) and gong (bracket block). Angs and gongs alternate, topped with melon leaf motifs.

Further Reading:

· Second Batch of Cultural Relic Protection Units of Hebei Province