East Great Hall

Foguang Si, Wutai County

This photo shows the East Great Hall (dong da dian) of Foguang Si, a temple in Wutai County. This building dates all the way back to the Tang dynasty (857 AD), one of the very few wooden halls to have survived from that early time up to the present. It carries a hipped roof, is seven bays wide by four bays deep, and faces west (sic; not south) above the temple's main yard.

Statues of Ananda and a Bodhisattva were recovered from the temple grounds, and are now exhibited in the Shanxi Provincial Museum in Taiyuan.