Ruins of Xiaoyao Tower

Ruins of Xiaoyao Tower

The ruins of Xiaoyao Tower are a cultural tourism attraction.

Located on the northern section of Binjiang Road in the downtown area, between Jiefang Bridge and Fubo Hill. Originally built during the Tang Dynasty, it served as the eastern gate tower of Gui Prefecture City in the Tang era, featuring a stone stele inscribed with the characters "Xiaoyao Tower" (逍遥楼), handwritten by Yan Zhenqing. Yan Zhenqing (709–785), courtesy name Qingchen, was a native of present-day Xi'an, Shaanxi. A successful candidate in the highest imperial examinations during the Kaiyuan era of the Tang Dynasty, he had served as an imperial censor and prefect of Pingyuan (now part of Shandong), later rising to the positions of Grand Tutor of the Heir Apparent and Duke of Lu Commandery, and was widely known as "Yan Lugong."

His calligraphy is noted for its solemnity, strength, and vigorous force, representing a unique style referred to as "Yan Style." Yan Zhenqing never visited Guilin. It is said that this stele was recarved based on a tracing from a tablet in Puzhou (present-day Yongji, Shanxi). Because it was placed on the eastern gate tower, the tower came to be called "Xiaoyao Tower." In the first year of the Chongning era of the Song Dynasty (1102), Cheng Jie, the military commissioner and pacification commissioner of Guangnan West Circuit, renovated the structure extensively and renamed it "Xiangnan Tower." The existing reverse side of the "Xiaoyao Tower" stele bears the "Record of Xiangnan Tower," which documents the tower’s renovation and the reasons for its renaming.