Museum of Forest of Stone Tablets Good morning, Ladies and gentlemen.I am your local guide.Today we are going to visit the treasure house of ancient calligraphy and stone carving art of China, the Museum of Forest of Stone Tablets, which is located at the site of Confucian temple in San Xue Street, Xi’an city.This museum collected more than 3000 stone tablets from the Han dynasty through the Qing dynasty.The whole area consists of 3 parts: Confucian temple, exhibition of stone tablets and stone carvings.//总述
As we all know, the Confucius, the great philosopher, educationist in feudal society.And he was highly respected by Chinese.In order to show the respect for him, all the Confucian temple have no gate facing south, the gate open to the east and west what we called the gate of righteousne and courtesy respectively.//简介孔子
Ok, now this way please.now, we can see a wooden Memorial arch standing here; its Chinese name is “PaiLou”.It is set up to commemorate a distinguished person; as we continue our walking, now we are on the bridge over pond in half circle It is a special structure of Confucian temple.In the ancient time only those students who paed the state examination would be allowed to pa here.//太和元气坊，畔池
Now let’s go through the stone gate in the middle which was only for high ranks in the past.Here we can see two national treasures.On the west side there is a stone horse which was one of few relics of DaXia short period.In the east pavilion there is the JingYun Bell .This Bell is unique in 3 aspects: first: it has exquisitely carving with phoenix and dragons.Second, it has beautiful sound which was recorded by CCTV and was played on New Years’ eve to welcome the New Year’s coming.Third, it has unique epigraph.//大夏石马，景云钟
Ok , now we are going to visit 7 major stone tablet exhibition rooms.In front of the first exhibition room, we can see the stone-base Claic of Filial piety which is the largest and earliest one in this museum.It stands about 6 meters high and was made up of 35 pieces of blue stones.It was engraved and annotated by LiLongJi.He wrote the preface to show his wish to manage the country by advocating the principles of Filial piety.//石台孝经
In the first room, we will see the most completed and heaviest books in the world “The KaiCheng stone Claics” which was the doctrine of the Confucius and “must readings” for all the intellectuals in feudal society.In the past, copying was the popular way for students who study the doctrines.To prevent copying errors, it was carved on stone tablets.With another claic “Mencius” carved in Qing dynasty together we call it “13 claics”.//开成石经
In the second room, we can see many stone tablets of calligraphy written by famous calligraphers of the Tang Dynasty.Up to today, these tablets have served as models for learners of calligraphy to follow.For example, the“ Tablet to Doubao Pagoda ” by Yan Zhenqing (颜真卿 多宝塔碑).And the world famous tablet is “the Nestorian Tablet” which was recorded the spread of Nestorians into China from Roman Empire.It provides valuable data for the study of the cultural exchanges between China and other countries.It decribes the Nestorian eence, ceremony, and activities in China during the Tang dynasty.It also bears the names of many miionaries(传教士) and records some incidents by Syrian.//大秦景教流行中国碑
In the third room, various style of Chinese calligraphy can be seen on stone tablets such as the seal script, the official script, regular script, running hand and cursive hand.Let me give you very brief introduction of the development of Chinese characters.The seal scripts were only popular in Qin dynasty, and it was difficult to read and write.Based on that, new forms were created: they are the official and regular scripts.This was easy to remember and today we still use them.Running and cursive hand were also boldly used by some calligraphers at that time.The“Tablet to Cao Quan”(汉曹全碑) was inscribed in official script.And this is the 1, 000-character Stone Tablet(断千字文) in cursive script from Monk huai su.//中国文字字体发展简史
The rest exhibition rooms house calligraphy and paintings, literatures and poems from different dynasties, such as Kuixing Diandou Tu, Guandi Shizhu Tu.And in the court yard, you can see many stone stakes with animals or figures carved on the top.In the past, they are for tying horses as well as for decoration.Ok, now we are in the stone carving gallery.It can be divided into two parts: mausoleum carvings and religious carvings.The pair of stone
animals,called “pi xie(辟邪)” and “tian lu”(天禄)，used to be placed in front of a mausoleum to protect it from the attack of evils.Here, I’d like to introduce the six famous steeds for you.They were sculpted in memory of the six horses, which had served the emperor,li shimin ,in constant wars.In memory of his horses, emperor Tang Tai zong had them carved to company his tomb.Two of the horses, known as \"Saluzi\" and \"Quanmaogwa”, are reproductions.The original works are now displayed in the Museum of Pennsylvania.//石刻艺术室(昭陵六骏) Now we come to the last section with both Buddhist and Taoist sculptures.Here, this carving of Bodda(菩萨像) belongs to the Sui Dynasty.And this is a statue of Li Er（老君像）, the founder of the theory of Taoism, a religion of the Han nationality. Ok, everyone, so much for this today.We still have some free time.We’ll leave at 2 o’clock, so please do not be late! And I’ll stay here, if you have any questions, you can ask me.By the way, watch your step please! Ok, it’s your turn.You can look around and enjoy yourselves.Thank you for lestening.
