Hua Pagoda of Guanghui Temple, Buddhist pagoda in Zhengding County, China.
Hua Pagoda of Guanghui Temple is a four-storey octagonal brick pagoda 40.5 m tall, facing south on Guanghui Road in Zhengding. Its lower three storeys are pavilion-style, with hexagonal single-storey annexes at the four corners of the first storey. The fourth storey is a bouquet-shaped body carved with eight tiers of figures: muscular guardians, roaring heads, lions, small square pagodas, elephants and bodhisattvas.
The Guanghui Temple itself was founded between 785 and 804, during the Zhenyuan era of the Tang. The pagoda's date is disputed: some accounts place it under the Sixteen Kingdoms or the Sui, others say it was destroyed under the Jin and rebuilt in the Dading era. In 1961 the State Council listed it among the first national key cultural relics, accepting the Jin reconstruction. Repairs from 1994 to 1999 restored its appearance.
The name Hua, "flower", comes from the bouquet-like fourth storey. That storey carries eight kinds of brick figures in eight registers: muscular guardians at the corners, lions and elephants standing on the faces, small square pagodas, lotus petals and bodhisattvas. Traces of old paint survive on the figures. The temple that gave the pagoda its name stood until the late Qing; only the pagoda remains.
The pagoda stands on Guanghui Road in Zhengding, facing south, with its entrance on the south side. The four corner shrines at the base were rebuilt in the 1994–1999 restoration, so the ground level now reads as the original layout did. The upper storeys are reached by stairs inside the first two levels; the fourth-level carvings are best seen from below, looking up.
The four hexagonal side chambers at the base were destroyed in the wars of the Republic of China era and rebuilt only during the 1994–1999 restoration, when the sculptures of the fourth storey were also completed. The finial could not be restored for lack of physical evidence, so only its shaft remains.
The community of curious travelers
AroundUs brings together thousands of curated places, local tips, and hidden gems, enriched daily by 94,123 contributors worldwide.