Brief Introduction to Baota Temple

East of Xiaotazi Village stands an ancient pagoda, and further east of the pagoda lie the ruins of an ancient city. Archaeologists have confirmed that the city site was the seat of Qi Prefecture built by Emperor Taizu Yelü Abaoji of the Liao Dynasty between 921 and 926 AD. The pagoda is also a surviving architectural relic of the Liao Dynasty. The village took its name from this ancient tower, and Baota Temple was constructed in the Qing Dynasty.

According to records, before the Xianfeng reign of the Qing Dynasty, there once stood an eight-square ancient temple to the west of the pagoda, together with three meditation halls. No historical records survive to document its construction date. During the Xianfeng reign, the abbot was a monk named Tongbao, originally surnamed Jiang. He took on a disciple named Xinwu, whose secular surname was Zhao. The two monks made their living by ferrying passengers. They first transported travellers in a small boat, and their business gradually flourished. Later they bought a large vessel more than fifty feet long, spacious enough to carry three horse-drawn carriages. The boat shuttled carriages, pedestrians and merchants every day, bringing in a steady stream of income. With the money they earned, they planned to expand the temple. They invited another monk named Kongjie from a temple in Fakumen. Construction of the expansion began in the Xianfeng period. The new temple occupied two hectares of land, bordering the highway to the south, a gully to the north, the ancient city wall to the east and the village to the west, with four tiers of main halls erected. A complete photograph of Baota Temple taken in the eighth year of the puppet Manchukuo Kant reign (1934) still survives today.

Facing the highway stood the Three-Horse Hall with three bays. The central bay served as a passage leading into the temple, with a horizontal plaque inscribed with the regular script characters “Baota Temple” above the lintel. A clay sculpture of a yellow horse was placed in the left room, and a red horse in the right room, the two being the war steeds of Guan Yunchang. The walls were whitewashed and painted with murals depicting stories from Romance of the Three Kingdoms. Two stone lions stood in front of the hall. A pair of stone flagpoles were donated by Jiang Huadong, replacing the original wooden ones. The compound was enclosed by stone balustrades without a formal front gate. The horse hall was connected to brick courtyard walls with side gates on both sides. With its unique layout, Baota Temple was elegant yet magnificent.

Entering the temple through the passage of the horse hall, visitors faced a solid brick screen wall with tightly fitted mortar joints. Also known as the partition wall or ornamental archway, it featured arched side doorways and a central shrine. A brick plaque with intaglio regular script reading “Eternal Clear Jade Waves” was mounted above the niche. The left vertical inscription reads “The eighth lunar month of the Renxu year, on an auspicious day”, and the right one reads “Erected devoutly by Abbot Liu Yuanhai”. According to the date, the screen wall was completed in the eighth lunar month of the first year of the Tongzhi reign (1862 AD), later than the main temple buildings. To the right front of the screen wall stood a Bell Tower, and to the left a Drum Tower. Both were wooden structures covered with grey tiles, solidly built with original designs. It is recorded that the Bell and Drum Towers now preserved in the Cultural Centre of Faku County were modelled after these two buildings. Two stone steles once stood behind the screen wall, which are now lost.

Immediately behind the screen wall rose the ancient brick pagoda. It is an eight-sided solid multi-eave structure with thirteen tiers, dating back to the Liao Dynasty. Its roof has collapsed into a rounded dome, and the pagoda finial is no longer intact.

Further north stood the Lord Guan Hall, a square building of three bays. A shrine was built in the main room housing a gilded clay statue of Lord Guan over five chi tall. Two dragon-carved gilded wooden pillars stood outside the shrine. The side chambers held clay statues of Zhou Cang, Guan Ping, the God of Thunder, Goddess of Lightning, Mother of Wind, God of Rain, the Five Kings, Four Divine Beasts, the Earth God and other deities. Statues of hell guards and judges were arranged in the foreground. All the clay figures were vivid and lifelike, and the walls were covered with murals of episodes from Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

Behind the Lord Guan Hall was the Goddess Hall, a spacious three-bay building. Each bay contained a shrine enshrining seated gilded statues of Yunxiao, Bixiao and Qionxiao, commonly known as the Three Younger Sisters. Standing statues lined both sides of the main hall, including goddesses presiding over childbirth, Grandma Dou, Grandfather of Descendants, as well as divine guardians Wang Lingguan and Zhao Lingguan who ward off evil spirits. The Goddess of Childbirth was the most revered deity. She was portrayed holding a baby boy in her arms, with such a lively expression that pilgrims would pray earnestly for sons.

The northernmost hall was the Three-Buddha Hall, a square single-bay building. Three gilded clay statues of the Buddhas of the Three Ages occupied the main niche, flanked by eighteen arhat statues with distinct facial features. The whitewashed walls were painted with scenes of the eighteen layers of hell. To the east of the Three-Buddha Hall stood the Guanyin Pavilion, taller and architecturally different from the other halls. The spacious pavilion housed a reverse-seated Guanyin statue. The whole pavilion complex consisted of nineteen rooms with the Guanyin Hall in the centre. It was presumably built earlier than the rest of the temple compound, yet its construction date remains unknown.

The Immortal Assembly Hall was built in the northwest corner of the temple, enclosed by a brick latticed wall with its own screen wall. Spirit tablets for fox immortals and other deities were placed inside the hall.

Five gatehouse rooms on the eastern side served as the abbot’s quarters. Ten east wing rooms and ten west wing rooms housed monks and boatmen. The temple maintained more than ten monks, five large ferrying boats and over fifty hectares of farmland. Apart from chanting scriptures and offering sacrifices, the monks hired labourers to operate ferry services and cultivate farmland.

Seven generations of abbots presided over Baota Temple:

After the death of Abbot Guangchan in the seventeenth year of the Republic of China (1928), the temple fell into decline and came under the administration of the Finance Bureau of Kangping County. Nevertheless, on the temple fair held on the eighteenth day of the fourth lunar month every year, crowds of male and female pilgrims of all ages flocked here. Incense curled upward, piles of offerings were laid out, and donations poured in endlessly. Judging from the prosperity in the Republican era, we can well imagine its heyday in the Qing Dynasty.

Although the temple buildings have vanished, the remaining cultural relics still shine brightly. These historic sites prove that Xiaotazi was once a busy transportation hub and a prosperous market town with flourishing politics, economy and culture during the Liao and Qing dynasties.