The Wuhou Temple
Good morning, ladies
and gentlemen, it’s my great honor to be your local guide.Today, we are going to visit the Chengdu Wuhou Temple.
Wuhou Temple is situated at the south of the Chengdu city and faces south.It’s adjacent to the Emperor Liubei’s tomb as well as his temple.
Now, we are at the entrance of the temple.During our visit, please stay close to the group and take good care of your belongings.We’ll start our tour at the tablet of three consummations, and then Emperor’s Hall, Zhuge Liang’s Hall and at last the emperor Liu Bei’s Tomb.After the free time, we’ll be back at the parking at 11:30.In case somebody gets lost, please also try to remember the bus number.
Wuhou Temple was built at the end of the Western Jin Dynasty.Between the Tang and Song Dynasties, Zhuge Liang and the Emperor Liu Bei had their independent temples.At the beginning of Ming Dynasty, the two separate temples merged into one.Towards the end of the Ming Dynasty, the merged temple was destroyed during war chaos.The present constructions date from the Qing Dynasty in
1672.
Wuhou Temple became a national cultural relic protection unit in 1961 and a museum in 1984.It is not only the most influential museum dedicated to the study of the Three Kingdoms culture, but also the only memorial shrine where the temple of a monarch and a temple of his subject are merged into one.
Du Fu, a famous poet in the Tang Dynasty once mentioned it in his poetry: “ Where would I find the Prime Minister’s shrine? Somewhere outside brocade city, in dense cypre trees.” Here “the Prime Minister’s shrine” is what we called Wuhou Temple nowadays.The remarks of Du Fu enable us to know where Wuhou Temple was located.
Well, ladies and gentlemen, may I have you attention, please? After we visit the LiuBei\'s Hall, here we are at the entrance of Zhuge Liang’s Hall.As you can see, inside the hall, horizontal inscribed boards and couplets which carry words of praise for Zhuge Liang are filling up the walls..Please look at the couplet hanging in front of you .It is the famous couplet written by Zhao Pan in 1902.Literally it means that:Try to persuade an enemy to stop his attack during the war, and the war will then disappear.No soldiers
wants to fight since ancient times.Try not to forget conditions and situations, otherwise, leniency and strict punishment will all fail.Those who manage Sichuan should think it over.Well, you may wonder how this couplet came to be? Now, let me tell you.In fact, the couplet contains two stories, and one of the stories tells us that once Zhuge Liang served as the general commander of the Kingdom of Shu, he was scheduled to attack the Kingdom of Wei in north China.However, he was worried that the troops of the minorities might take this opportunity to hara the Shu Kingdom in southwest China.So he went to that areas with his troops and wished to establish a good relationship with the minorities.At that time, Meng Huo is the top leader of the minorities, he didn’t accept Zhuge Liang’s good wish and sent his soldiers to fight against the troops from the Shu.Zhuge Liang succefully defeated Meng ’s attack and caught him.Instead of punishing Meng Huo, Zhuge Liang set him free.Then Meng Huo launched another attack, however, he met with the same defeat., and Zhuge liang set him free again.On the seventh time when Meng Huo was caught, Meng prostrated himself before Zhuge Liang, saying
that he and his soldiers had given up on attacking, and he would like sincerely to have a good relationship with the Shu.From then on, the minority people and people of the Shu lived in peace.
From this story, we can know that as a military official, Zhuge Liang was able to convince his opponents with his wisdom and defeat his rivals by psychological tactics. Well, ladies and gentlemen, now you have 10minutes to walk around.Please don’t hesitate to ask me if you have further questions.Later on, I will give you more general information and interesting stories about the hall.
Thanks for your attention!
