The Main Hall of Jinxian Temple in Pengxi

The Main Hall of Jinxian Temple in Pengxi

The Main Hall of Jinxian Temple in Pengxi is a National Key Cultural Relics Protection Unit.

In July 2008, during the third national cultural relics survey, the Suining Municipal Cultural Relics Survey Team discovered a Yuan Dynasty structure, Jinxian Temple, in Zhoujiadian Village, Chicheng Town, Pengxi County, Suining City, Sichuan Province. Only the main hall remains today. The architectural features are distinctive, with a relatively large number of inscriptions preserved, containing rich information. Judging from the inscriptions, the temple was built in the fourth year of the Taiding era of the Yuan Dynasty (1327). It is one of the only ten remaining ancient Yuan Dynasty buildings in Sichuan Province and the first confirmed existing Yuan Dynasty structure within Suining City. Compared with other Yuan Dynasty buildings in Sichuan, Jinxian Temple exhibits many common elements of Sichuan-style architecture, as well as architectural features unique to its time and place.

According to the "Pengxi County Annals": "Twenty li north of Pengxi County town lies an ancient temple called Jinxian, formerly the Great Qianan." "Jinxian Temple is located twenty li north of the city, featuring an eight-sided flying wheel pavilion, thirty-six feet high, with a circumference of eighty spans. It has two levels: the upper level houses various Buddha statues, while the lower level is a lotus pedestal with an incense niche inside. Outside, there is a platform with pillars that can accommodate over twenty people. Strong individuals can push it, and when the mechanism is triggered, it rotates left and right. The locals find it quite marvelous. It is said to have been donated and constructed by the monk Dexing in the second year of the Tianli era of the Yuan Dynasty, taking four years to complete."

The main hall of Jinxian Temple originally had three bays in both width and depth, but due to topographical constraints, the dimensions varied slightly. It sits on a platform five feet high, with an eight-step ramp. The roof is a single-eave hip-and-gable style, covered with plain blue tiles, and the main ridge once featured a fish-dragon gable ornament and a precious bottle finial, both now long gone. A front bay was added later. Under the eaves, twelve bracket sets (dougong) are installed on the column tops, with one additional set each in the front and rear central bays and the first two bays of the gable walls, totaling eighteen sets, with more intricate designs in the front and simpler ones at the back. The dougong are quite plain, hewn directly from timber, with few jumps and no upward projections (ang), which commentators note is common in Yuan Dynasty architecture. The corner brackets feature diagonal beams, with corner bracket sets (zhuǎnjiǎo pūzuò) placed at the rear ends. Additionally, a horizontal timber supports the ends of the diagonal beams to hold the crab claw brackets and corner rafters, a method considered typical in Sichuan construction. Numerous inscriptions are found throughout, often noting who built the structure and when, or who donated silver or timber, and from where.

The Jinxian Temple shares common features with other Yuan Dynasty structures in Sichuan. For example, the use of densely arranged bracket arms on the cantilever beams references the front eave bracket sets of the South Gate and Great Buddha Hall of Nandai Temple. Each jump of the bracket arm is lined vertically with small bracket sets, a hallmark of the so-called “full bracketing” technique. Although the materials used in this hall are quite varied—round, square, large, or small beams interconnect with蜀柱 (shu zhu, short columns) and uprights through complex tensioning, reflecting a strong structural engineering approach.

The village where Jinxian Temple now stands has been renamed Jinxian Village, Chicheng Town, Pengxi County. In 2012, it was designated as part of the eighth batch of Provincial Key Cultural Relics Protection Units by the People's Government of Sichuan Province.

On October 7, 2019, the Main Hall of Jinxian Temple in Pengxi was included in the eighth batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units.

Protected area: A 100-meter buffer zone extending outward from the outer edge of the main hall’s platform.

Construction control zone: A 20-meter buffer extending outward from the protected area.

Further reading:

· Eighth Batch of Sichuan Provincial Cultural Relics Protection Units

· Eighth Batch of National Key Cultural Relics Protection Units