| The
Tengwang Pavilion, located on the bank of the Yangtze
River, west of Nanchang City, is one of the three famous
pavilions south of the Yangtze River (the other two are
Yueyang Tower in Yueyang and Yellow Crane Tower in Wuhan).
The
pavilion was built in AD 653, when Tengwang Li Yuanying
(King Teng), a younger brother of Emperor Taizong of the
Tang Dynasty, was the governor of Nanchang. It was destroyed
and rebuilt as many as 28 times until it was burned to
ashes in 1926. In 1989, the pavilion was rebuilt again
according to the style of architecture in the Song Dynasty.
This nine-storied structure stands at 57.5 meters in height
and occupies a construction area of 13,000 square meters
with a 12-meter-long base symbolic of ancient city walls.
Made of reinforced cement, the pavilion, featuring flying
eaves and engraved beams, looks quite splendid.
The
reputation of Tengwang Pavilion, to a great extent, is
due to a well-known prose - "Preface to Tengwang
Pavilion" by Wangbo. It was said that when the author,
a reputable poet of the Tang, passed Nanchang on his way
to Guangdong, he wrote this prose on the subject of the
banquet which was being held to celebrate the reconstruction
of the pavilion. With the spread of this prose, Tengwang
Pavilion became proverbial. |