Zhenhai tower | West Building, full of chanting.
? Yuexiu Mountain, with towering green trees and numerous historical sites, is the Baoshan of Guangzhou. There is an extraordinary 600-year-old ancient building in Yuexiu Mountain, named zhenhai tower, also known as "Wanghai Building", commonly known as "five-story building". During the Hongwu period of the Ming Dynasty, zhenhai tower became famous throughout the city immediately after its completion. Everyone rushed to see this unique and magnificent five-story pavilion. The style of this building is as magnificent as its name "zhenhai tower" hanging on the horizontal plaque on the front of the five-story roof. Foreign merchant ships crossing the ocean knew that they had arrived in Guangzhou when they saw zhenhai tower standing on the Yuexiu Mountain from a distance.
? In Qing Dynasty, zhenhai tower was listed as one of the eight scenic spots in Yangcheng, named "zhenhai tower". After the founding of New China, 1986 was listed as "Yuexiu Building" as the new eight scenic spots in Yangcheng. Zhenhai tower, the pearl of Guangzhou's historical and cultural sites, has become a dazzling business card in Guangzhou, the starting point and the highest point of Guangzhou's traditional central axis. Although there are only five floors in zhenhai tower, this 30-meter-high pavilion is located on the high Yuexiu Mountain, which was the tallest building in Guangzhou during the Ming and Qing Dynasties. It stands on a small plate in Longgang, Yuexiu Mountain, with a magnificent shape. Tourists walk up the mountain road and look up at the high-spirited Zhenhai Tower exposed in the green forest at the top of the mountain, which is quite a feeling of standing on the wall and towering into the sky. When you board the plane, you can see a panoramic view of the whole city. In ancient times, you can see the waves of the Pearl River rippling in the south, which is very spectacular. It is true that the Pearl River is not a sea, but in the Ming Dynasty it was at least 65,438+0,000 meters wide and looked like a sea in Wang Yang. Therefore, for a long time, the Pearl River with a vast surface was called "the sea". People in Guangzhou always call crossing the Pearl River "crossing the sea" and Wangjiang "watching the sea". That's how zhenhai tower got the word "sea". Qu Dajun, the "three outstanding figures in Lingnan" in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties, vividly described in Guangdong Xinyu: "The fourth floor (the four famous buildings in Guangzhou) is the best in Zhenhai. From the sea, it looks like the breath of jiaozi ... It is unique, magnificent and unique, although the Yellow Crane is in Yueyang. "
? Zhenhai Tower was built in the 13th year of Hongwu in the early Ming Dynasty (1380). When Zhu Liangzu, a Ming general who was not in Guangdong at that time, arrived in Guangzhou, he found that the city was "low-pass" and there was no city (moat) in the north, which was unfavorable for defense. So, "I ask you to unite three cities to build a foothill in the northeast to expand it." So I leaned back against Yuexiu, leaned forward against the Pearl River ... and built a spectacular zhenhai tower. " (Yellow Festival "Rebuilding zhenhai tower"), the emperor received the report and immediately reported it. Zhu Liangzu integrated the east, west and middle cities of the Song Dynasty, and opened up a northern city of more than 800 feet. The city wall spans Yuexiu Mountain. This five-story tower was built at the highest part of the city wall. It was originally named "Wanghailou" and later named "zhenhai tower", which means "Hero Town in the Sea". The building was rebuilt several times later. During the reconstruction of 17 (1928) in the Republic of China, the original wooden structure in the building was changed into reinforced concrete structure, and the masonry exterior wall was basically an old thing in the Ming Dynasty.
? There is also a folklore that Zhu Liangzu is brave in fighting, but he believes in Feng Shui. According to "Sword of Guangdong" written by Wang Wanli in the 29th year (160 1), "According to legend, the vein of the city condenses here from the mountains in the northwest, which covers the gathering of the king's qi and pretends to suppress it." According to legend, Mr. Feng Shui told Zhu Liangzu that Yuexiu Mountain is surrounded by mountains and waters, overlooking the vast sea. "The situation is big, and there is an image of partial hegemony", which is where the king can appear. Nowadays, the sea has become a "kingly spirit" that covers the green sky. If this "kingly spirit" continues to rise, the country of the Ming Dynasty will be in jeopardy. Hearing this, Zhu Liangzu didn't dare to neglect it. He quickly wrote a letter and sent someone to the court on a starry night. Zhu Yuanzhang read the paper deeply, and immediately ordered Zhu Liangzu to build a tower on the Yuexiu Mountain to suppress this "Ziyun Huangqi Alien". Although this is only a folk tale, we can see that people in Guangdong respect zhenhai tower. ?
? Zhenhai tower is a rare multi-storey pavilion-style building in China's ancient buildings. Its peculiar appearance is "the building is tower-shaped, and the tower looks like a building", but the building has the style of a tower. The pavilion faces south and is 28 meters high. The width of the first floor is 3 1 m, the depth is16m, and the gables are 3.9m thick. The walls on the first and second floors are red sandstone strips, and there are more than three brick walls. Just looking at this material will add a sense of history. The whole building is rectangular, with five pavilions and pavilions, the external walls are decreasing step by step, there are five layers of composite eaves, and the cornices are tilted layer by layer, covered with green glazed tiles. The roof is decorated with colored glazed fish in Shiwan, and each floor of the building has a flat waist eaves, which looks like a tower. The steadiness and solemnity of the red wall and the agility of the reflection of the green tile constitute a very harmonious unity of opposites visually. Guangzhou Museum is located in zhenhai tower, with a history of 90 years (see the article "Guangzhou Museum Interprets Guangzhou History"). Zhenhai tower, a magnificent and solemn ancient building, is like a wise man who has experienced many vicissitudes, leading modern people who have traveled through the mountains to search for the historical situation to enter the colorful historical corridor and savor the past and the present.
? During the 600-odd years after the establishment of zhenhai tower, due to war, natural and man-made reasons, it was repeatedly robbed and ruined. There have been many renovations in history, all of which are based on "keeping the old as before, looking at the old in a broad way and adding it" (see the inscription on the zhenhai tower stone tablet on the west side of zhenhai tower). Today, zhenhai tower is a national key cultural relics protection unit, and it is also carefully protected.
? Since ancient times, it has become China's literary tradition for literati to climb high and look far, taking poetry as the scenery and promoting it with poetry. Zhenhai tower, a scenic spot in Lingnan, is the best creative material for poets. For hundreds of years, countless poets and celebrities have written many touching poems and couplets for it. Among zhenhai tower's couplets, the following couplets hung on both sides of the "zhenhai tower" horizontal plaque on the fifth floor are the most popular:
? Thousands of dangerous houses have been robbed, so who will pick the bucket?
? Five hundred years later, Hou An is here, let me lean on the fence to see the sword and cry for the hero!
? How magnificent and gloomy! The rise and fall of history and deep feelings give people a strong appeal of "crying heroes". This couplet was written by Peng Yulin, a senior minister of the Ministry of War in the late Qing Dynasty. Peng Yulin is famous for his integrity and frugality. He shoulders the heavy responsibility of resisting foreign aggression. Standing on Zhenhai Tower, he looked back and saw the sword wound today. He couldn't help feeling sorry for each other and wrote this couplet. Some people suspect that Li Dihua, his chief of staff, is a ghost. Most critics lament that it is the commander-in-chief's mind that makes me lean on the fence and cry for the hero.
? Hu, a politician of the Republic of China who has been following Sun Yat-sen's revolution, also wrote a couplet for zhenhai tower and hung it on the front of the fifth floor:
? Wuling comes from the north, and Zhuhai is most suitable for moonlit nights.
? Looking at the tower in the evening, the white clouds are still autumn in the Han Dynasty.
? During the reign of Emperor Kangxi in the Qing Dynasty, Tan Cui wrote Chu Zhu Ting Lu, and quoted some epigrams of zhenhai tower, such as CoCo Lee, a Guangzhou poet in the Ming Dynasty, who said, "The earth turns to green hills to open wells, and the sky hangs and the water falls"; Liang Youyu, a poet in the Ming Dynasty, once wrote that "the stars hang sea trees at dusk, and the clouds break the mountain clock in autumn"; At the end of Ming Dynasty and the beginning of Qing Dynasty, Chen Gongyin said, "Five Ridges extend from the north to the ground and Kyushu from the south to the sky". What Tan Cui appreciates most is the poem "zhenhai tower" by Ou Daren, a poet in Ming Dynasty, saying that his poem is full of charm, so it is necessary to make good use of this chapter. Poetry cloud:
? Looking at the rivers and mountains with emotion, the gray level Chu entered the sky.
? Shimen is north to Tongqinsai, and the water is south to the Han Palace.
? Autumn scenery is beautiful because the empty sill is loose and the sound is heavy.
? Yao's fiefs are everywhere in Shuonan, so I'm worried about hearing about hegemony.
? Famous historical figures who wrote poems and couplets for zhenhai tower include Zhang Zhidong, Kang Youwei, Qiu, Qu Dajun and Liao, and there are also many outstanding works written by contemporary poets for zhenhai tower. More than ten years ago, Guangzhou Museum edited and published a collection of poems praising zhenhai tower by ancient and modern poets, which included zhenhai tower's masterpieces of past dynasties. It was impassioned, touching and exciting to read. □