Dunhuang
Dunhuang lies at the western
end of the Hexi Corridor in Gansu
Province in Northwest China, an oasis
on the eastern edge of Takli- makan
Desert. It is nourished by melted
snow water from the Qilian Mountains.
The ancient town used to be an important
stop-over point on the Silk Road.
The name "Dunhuang" was
given in the Han Dynasty. In Chinese
"Dun" means grandness and
" Huang" means prosperity.
In the 2nd century B.C. Emperor Wudi
of the Han Dynasty sent imperial envoy
Zhang Qian to the Western Regions,
opening up a trade route which was
to be known as the "Silk Road"
in history.The imperial court set
up Dunhuang Prefecture in A.D. 111
and Dunhuang became a strategic town.
Through this route Chinese culture
and products, especially silk, were
introduced to European and Middle
East coun tries, and foreign culture
and products such as Buddhism of India
came to central China. Much of Buddhism
is propagated through artistic forms,
which were soon assimilated into the
Chinese traditional culture. The result
was that many Buddhist images were
carved in caves in mountain cliffs
along the Silk Road. Many of them
have been well preserved. The best
are those at Mogao in Dunhuang. The
Dunhuang Grotto Art is composed of
the Cave and Yulin Grottos in Anxi.
Carving of the Mogao Grottos, commonly
known as 1, 000- Buddha Caves, began
in AD 366 and continued through a
dozen dynasties including the Northern
Liang , Northern Wei, Western Wei,
Northern Zhou, Sui, Tang, Five-Dynasties
Period, Song, Huihe, Western Xia and
Yuan. The extant 492 caves preserve
more than 2, 000 color statues and
45,000 square meters of murals. The
mural themes depict Buddha portraits,
stories and interpretations of Buddhist
scriptures, Buddhist history, legends,
portraits of devotees and various
decorative patterns. They describe
different ethnic groups, people's
lives such as nobles' outings, singing,
dancing and music, farming, fishing
and hunting, acrobatics and martial
art practice, foreign envoys and merchants
on the Silk Road. Some scholars liken
these murals to a "library on
the wall, " In the early 20th
century some 50,000 pieces of cultural
relics were found in the Scripture-Keeping
Cave including handwritten documents
and more than 1,000 pieces of silk
painting, graphic painting , embroidery
and calligraphy. Put together the
art works would form a 25-kilometer-long
art gallery. The Mogao Grottos were
dug in loose sedimentary conglomerate
of the the Quaternary Period. Some
parts collapsed in earthquakes. But
the dry weather has preserved the
basic outlook of the cliffs. In the
1940s the Dunhuang Art Research Institute
was established at Mogao. After the
founding of the People's Republic
of China, the new government began
an overall repair and reinforcement
project on 39 caves, saving 1,800
square meters of murals and 200 color
statues. The Western 1,000-Buddha
Cave and Yulin Grottos at Anxi have
been public after renovation. Grottos
in Dunhuang are a national treasure
of China and a cultural heritage of
the world. In 1962 the State Council
put them among China's first key cultural
relics under state protection and
in 1991 the UNESCO put them on its
list of world natural and cultural
heritages. This album includes the
best works representing different
historical periods with brief introductions.
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