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East side of the Chaoyang South Pagoda (朝阳南塔 東面) Van Cutsem, Laurent

Description

Chaoyang South Pagoda (朝阳南塔) is a 42.6-meter high stone pagoda made of one story and 13-story stacked eaves (密檐). It was named the South Pagoda because it is to the south of the Chaoyang North Pagoda (朝阳北塔). Similar to the North Pagoda, the South Pagoda was reconstructed in Liao Dynasty (辽代, 907-1125), but the exact time is not yet determined. In 2004, an underground relic crypt was found 50 meters away from the base of the South Pagoda. The relic crypt was interred in 984 but it is unclear how the crypt was related to the pagoda. Not much iconography was left on the four sides of the pagoda, but the holes left on them now became the lovely houses of swallows. On the east side of the pagoda, there are two cartouches to the upper left and right with inscriptions "庵羅衛林維摩塔" (anluo weilin weimo ta) and "婆羅林中圓寂塔" (poluo linzhong yuanji ta).

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Attribution 4.0 International