Stele Forest

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An entrance to the Stele Forest

An ink rubbing of one of the calligraphy stela at the Beilin Museum in Xi'an, called the "God of Literature Pointing the Dipper." It depicts the figure, made up of the characters describing the four Confucian virtues, "pointing the dipper" (an expression for coming first in the imperial civil service examinations).

The Stele Forest, or Xi'an Beilin Museum (碑林; pinyin: Bēilín), is a museum for steles and stone sculptures which is located in Xi'an, China. In 1944 it was the principal museum for Shaanxi Province on the site of what was formerly a 11th century Confucius Temple. Then because of the large number of steles, it was officially re-named as the Forest of Stone Steles in 1992. All together, there are 3,000 steles in the museum, which is divided into seven exhibitions halls, which mainly display works of calligraphy, painting and historical records. ^[1]

[edit] History

The Stele Forest began with the Kaicheng Shi Jing Steles (开成石经碑) and Shitai Xiao Jing Steles (石台孝经碑), two groups of steles both carved in the Tang dynasty and displayed in the temple to Confucius in Chang'an. In 904, a rebel army sacked Chang'an, and the two stele were evacuated to the inner city. In 962, they were again moved to the rebuilt temple to Confucius. In the Song Dynasty (1087), a special hall, with attached facilities, was built to house and display the two Stele groups. It was damaged in the 1556 Shaanxi earthquake during the Ming dynasty.

[edit] Steles

It houses nearly 3000 steles and it is the biggest collection of steles in China. Most of its exhibits are steles of the Tang Dynasty. Ink rubbings of the steles are available for sale.

Among the unusual examples is a 18th-century stele depicting a Yangtze River flood control project. Another appears to be a bamboo forest, but on examination the leaves and branches form a poem.