Yongning Temple Stele

The Yongning Temple Stele is a stone monument inscribed on multiple sides with Chinese, Jurchen, Mongolian, and Tibetan scripts. The monument stands about 1.8 meters (5 feet 10 inches) tall and is now housed at the Arsenyev Museum in Vladivostok.

The Ming dynasty erected this stele in 1413 to commemorate the founding of Yongning Temple by eunuch Yishiha at the Nurgan military garrison. A companion monument was installed two decades later at the same location.

The stone carries the Buddhist mantra Om mani padme hum in four different scripts, reflecting the multilingual character of the region during that time. These inscriptions show how people from different backgrounds gathered in one place and shared their beliefs.

The stele is now part of the collection at the Arsenyev Museum in Vladivostok, where visitors can examine it alongside its companion monument from 1433. Those wishing to see these artifacts should check the museum's opening hours and accessibility beforehand.

This is the final recorded large-scale inscription using the Jurchen script before the writing system fell out of use. The monument thus preserves a rare record of a script that would soon disappear.

Inception: 1413

GPS coordinates: 52.94000,139.76000

Latest update: December 10, 2025 20:07