Jiezi Ancient Town

Location: Jiezi Ancient Town, Fengqi Mountain, Congzhou City, Chengdu

Reason to visit: a wonderful historical site, a good combination of natural scenery and artificial designs

Our ratings: ★★★★

Entrance fee: Free

Opening Hours: All day

Jiezi Ancient Town is located in Chongzhou, not far from the famous Taoist mountain Qingcheng, Sichuan Province. With a history of over 1,000 years, it includes 32 temples and a great number of other historical sites. It features an ancient temple which could be traced back to Jin Dynasty, primitive forests, an age-old gingko trees and Nan trees, an ancient stone pagoda and a well preserved ancient street. The town is a good combination of natural scenery and artificial designs.

Jiezi Ancient Town reflects the unique natural scenery of southwestern Sichuan. It has a profound and outstanding cultural heritage; its products have influenced the political and military affairs of the whole country; the existing buildings are simple and small, which is a typical builidngs reflecting the style of the southwestern towns in Qing Dynasty.

History of Jiezi Ancient Town

Jiezi is famous for its ancient bluestone roads, ancient houses and locals who have lived here for generations. The street has been built for more than a thousand years.

In the forty-two years of Wanli, only the street of Hejiezi (河街子) was left in the ancient town, which was called ‘Street Field’. Later, in the Qing Dynasty and the Republic of China, it declined and revived many times. In the Five Dynasties, it was named "Hengqu Town" because it was named after the riverside of the Weijiang River.

After the Five Dynasties, Yongkang County was established. Later, after the important historical events of the dynasties, politics and economy have risen and fallen repeatedly. When Jiezi Ancient Town flourished, it used to govern one land for the county. When it fell, there was only one small street.

In the forty-two years of the Ming Dynasty (also the year of AD 1615), there was only one street along the river.

In 1940, the street was established, and after the founding of the country, it was the street town.

In 1991, the town was rebuilt and the town was built.

In 2008, the “5·12” Wenchuan Earthquake, the ancient town of Jiezi was hit hard. After two years of post-disaster reconstruction, on May 10, 2010, Jiezi Ancient Town became the national 4A-level tourist scenic spot.

What to See in Jiezi Ancient Town

1. Ziku Tower

The Ziku Tower was built during the Qing Daoguang period and was built with stone, stone piers, and blue bricks. The tower is 15 meters high. The tower is in a shape of hexahedron, divided into five layers, and the top four outer walls are engraved with murals such as 'White Snake'. The people here believe that "the word is a blessing". They believe that it is a wicked thing to discard and contaminate the paper with words. The discarded paper should be placed in a special paper basket and incinerated. So two fonts dedicated to paper burning were built at the entrance and exit of the street. The one at the entrance to the station has been destroyed, and the one at the end of the scene has been preserved and has become a landscape of the ancient town.

2. Guangyan Temple

Guangyan Temple, also known as the 'Ancient Temple', is 1100 meters above sea level. It is hidden in the dense forest of Fengqi Mountain, surrounded by mountains and lush forests. The ancient temple was built in the Jin Dynasty.

Zhu Yuanzhang (the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty)'s uncle and grandson Jianwen's emperor both took refuge here. The "Hongwu Nanzang", which was given to the ancient temple by the imperial court of the Ming Dynasty, was the only preserved edition in the three official editions of the Ming Dynasty. It weighed 11 tons. With a volume of 1.505 cubic feet, it is a classic of Chinese Buddhism. The ancient temple enjoys the reputation of "the first day of Xichuan" because it once owned this treasure.

3．Tang Qiu's Hometown

Tang Qiu, a "one-poet poet" in the Tang Dynasty, although his poem is not as famous as Li Bai's and Du Fu's in the dynasty, but you can find his traces in "Full Tang Poetry" and "Tang Caizi Biography". Wang Xiaobo, the leader of the peasant uprising in the Song Dynasty, was also a Jiezi local, and there are still two former residences in the town.

How to Get to Jiezi Ancient Town

1. Take the shuttle bus to the 102 parking lot of Jiezi Town. The shuttle runs every 30 minutes.