Cave containing more than 2000 Buddha statues in China

With an age of up to 1,600 years, the Mogao Caves (Gansu, China) are located at the center of the legendary Silk Road and became the cultural and religious intersection of the East and the West.

In 1987, Mogao Caves was officially recognized by UNESCO as a World Cultural Heritage. (Source: nguoiquansat.vn)

Mogao Caves, also known as Thousand Buddha Caves or Thousand Buddhas Caves, are located in Gansu Province, China, about 25km southeast of Dunhuang city center. In 1987, Mogao Caves was officially recognized by UNESCO as a World Cultural Heritage.

Overcoming historical events, the Mogao Grottoes now preserve nearly 500 caves, more than 2,000 Buddha statues of various sizes, the largest statue is 33m high and the smallest is 10cm, along with nearly 50,000 square meters of murals. The Mogao Grottoes are the place where the quintessence of Buddhist stone carving art is concentrated and contains relics that clearly reflect ancient Chinese civilization through the Tang and Song dynasties.

Mogao Grottoes are 1,600 meters long and contain nearly 500 caves. (Source: nguoiquansat.vn)

Most of the murals in the caves are on Buddhist themes, from images of Buddhas, Bodhisattvas, and the Jade Emperor to Buddhist scriptures, combining legends and historical figures from India, Central Asia, and China. Therefore, Western scholars consider the murals and sculptures in the Mogao Caves as “Museums on the Cliff”.

The interior of the Mogao Grottoes is designed with wooden structures, lotus stone pillars and tiles, along with thousands of giant cloth panels. If all the murals were connected together, they would form a 25km long corridor of paintings. In addition, about 50,000 Buddhist scriptures and historical documents written by hand are preserved inside the cave.

Mogao Caves is known as a “Museum on the cliff”. (Source: nguoiquansat.vn)

In 1900, a treasure trove of cultural relics was discovered and later called Kinh Dong. This is a small cave about 3m wide and long, containing more than 500 thousand cultural relics including scriptures, documents, embroideries, paintings, brocades with Buddha images... The age of the cultural relics spans from the 4th to 11th centuries, belonging to many content categories such as history, politics , ethnicity, military, language, literature and art, religion, medicine, science and technology... of China, Central Asia, South Asia and Europe, known as "Encyclopedia of ancient China".

Source: https://baoquocte.vn/hang-dong-chua-hon-2000-tuong-phat-tai-trung-quoc-265084.html