Wenjin Street

　　Wenjin Street is not long, but quite famous. It is located to the west of Beihai Park and adjacent to Fuyou Street. Its fame comes from the fact that there is the historic Beijing Library on this street; and the reason it was named “Wenjin” is directly related to this library.

　　The Beijing Library is the largest and most comprehensive library in China in terms of scale and collection. Its predecessor was the Metropolitan Library established in the late Qing Dynasty. The Metropolitan Library once received the collections of the Ming Dynasty’s imperial library — the “Wenyuan Pavilion,” dating back five hundred years, some of which are rare books traceable to the “Jixi Hall” of the Southern Song Dynasty in the 13th century. It is said that the Beijing Library houses over 200,000 rare ancient volumes, mainly including Buddhist scriptures written during the Tang Dynasty, printed books from the Song and Yuan Dynasties, the Yongle Encyclopedia compiled in the early Ming Dynasty, and the Complete Library of the Four Treasuries compiled during the Qing Dynasty.

　　Wenjin Street

　　The Complete Library of the Four Treasuries is the largest series of books compiled during the Qing Dynasty under Emperor Qianlong. It took 16 years to collect, compile, and transcribe. The entire collection comprises over 79,000 volumes, 36,300 books, and more than 990 million characters. At the time, seven copies were handwritten, each stored in a different location: the Wenyuan Pavilion in the Forbidden City in Beijing, the Wenjin Pavilion in the Old Summer Palace in Yuanmingyuan, the Wensu Pavilion in the Shenyang Imperial Palace (then called Fengtian), the Wenjin Pavilion in the Mountain Resort in Rehe, the Wenhui Pavilion in the Daguan Hall in Yangzhou, the Wenzong Pavilion in the Jinshan Temple in Zhenjiang, and the Wanjuan Pavilion in the Shengyin Temple in Hangzhou. Three of these seven copies were destroyed by fire. The copy in the Wenyuan Pavilion was burned when the Anglo-French Allied Forces set fire to the Old Summer Palace; the copies in the Wenhui and Wenzong Pavilions were destroyed during the Taiping Rebellion. Currently, four copies remain, with one from the Wenjin Pavilion being transported to Beijing in 1915.

　　The Beijing Library opened in 1912. Its original location was in the Guanghua Temple at Shichahai, then it moved to Pinglunjia Hutong; in 1931, it relocated to the west side of Beihai Park. When the current Beijing Library building was being planned in 1928, the street in front of the library had no name. Since the library housed the Complete Library of the Four Treasuries, which was originally stored in the “Wenjin Pavilion,” the name “Wenjin” was chosen, and the street was named Wenjin Street.

　　After the liberation, in order to meet the needs of traffic development while preserving the original appearance, the bridge deck was widened to 34 meters, the bridge body was extended from seven arches to nine, and the slope of the bridge deck was reduced by 2%. The stone railings of the approach bridge retained the same design and patterns as before, still appearing symmetrical and elegant. Unfortunately, during the “Ten Years of Turmoil,” the original jade railings were removed and replaced with ten-foot-high iron fences, giving people a sense of confinement. Whenever passing over this large bridge, one often recalls those terrifying and frightening days. Some have suggested removing the iron fences and restoring the original stone railings to bring back the bridge’s former beauty.

　　Source: Beijing Municipal Commission of Tourism Development