The Lion Grove is one of the four gardens in Suzhou. It is located on Yuanlin Road in the old city of Suzhou. In the second year of Zhizheng in the Yuan Dynasty (1342), the disciples of the famous monk Tianru Zen Master "joined the capital to buy land and build a house." He lived as his teacher. "Because there are thousands of bamboo poles in the forest, and there are many strange rocks under the bamboos, which look like Suan Ni (lion)"; and because Tianru Zen Master Wei Ze obtained the Dharma at Puyin Guoshizhong Peak of Tianmu Mountain. To commemorate the relationship between teachers and teachers in Buddhism, it is named Lion Forest, which means the lion in the Buddhist scriptures. In the twelfth year of Yuan Zhizheng (1352), the name was changed to Bodhi Zhengzong Temple, and the temple was later abandoned. During the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, the temple and the garden were separated by a partition wall. The garden was rebuilt by Huang Xingzu, the magistrate of Hengzhou, and was named "She Garden". In the thirty-sixth year of Qianlong's reign (1771), Huang Xingzu's son Huang Xi became the top scholar in high school. He reorganized the courtyard and named it "Five Pine Garden". In the seventh year of the Republic of China (1918), the Suzhou pigment king Bei Renyuan (also known as Runsheng) purchased the old garden and invited famous teachers to rebuild the pavilions and halls. It took 9 years to build the roughly current scale: the ancestral hall in the front, the residence in the back, and the garden in the west. It covers an area of ??about 15 acres. In 1953, descendants of Bei's family donated the Lion Forest to the country. After renovation, it was opened in February 1954.
Lion Grove 1 Gate and Ancestral Hall
The Lion Grove Scenic Area is located in the north and faces south. The arched doorway is engraved with the three official characters "Shizilin". It is said that this character is the name of Emperor Qianlong of Jiangsu Province. Suzhou Lion Forest Yubi. Look closely at the word "lion" missing the word "犭". The main entrance of the scenic spot is closed, and tourists enter and exit through the side doors on both sides.
After checking in and entering the front yard, you are faced with a tall and spacious hall. On the roof of the Lion Forest in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province is the sculpture of the Three Stars of Fortune, Luxu and Shou, which means "Three Stars Shining High". This hall was originally the ancestral hall of the Bei family. Walking into the hall, there are Qing-style mahogany carved chairs and coffee tables on display. In the middle is a pair of bronze southern lions, which are very lively and cute.
Looking up, I saw the horizontal plaque "Yunlin Yiyun" hanging high on the beam, handwritten by Gu Tinglong, a famous calligrapher from Suzhou. Yunlin is the nickname of Yuan Dynasty painter Ni Zan. In the sixth year of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty (1373), when Ni Jiangsu Suzhou Lion Lin Zan passed the Lion Forest, he responded to the request of Abbot Ruhai to paint and write a poem for the Lion Forest.
There is a couplet hanging on the hall: "The small bridge on the pillow leads to He City; the old garden of Senfeng leads to the Lion Grove". The first couplet, "Small bridge pillowing water", highlights the scenery of Suzhou's water town. There is a poem that goes: "When you come to Suzhou, you will see that all the houses are nestled by the river. There are few free spaces in the ancient palaces, but there are many small bridges in the water ports." "Crane City" is the name of an ancient street in Suzhou. According to "Wuyue Chunqiu" written by Zhao Ye of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the daughter of King Helu of Wu died young. On the day of the funeral, cranes were dancing and singing in the city. The place was called "Crane City" and the bridge was called "Crane Dance Bridge". Used in couplets, it shows the fairy-like atmosphere of the Lion Grove. The second couplet says that the Lion Grove Garden is famous for its rockeries and stacked rocks. The exquisite Taihu stones in the garden are stacked into rockeries of various shapes. The stone caves at the bottom of the peak are ethereal, and the west of the garden is a waterscape garden. Although it has been rebuilt many times, the simplicity and freehand gardening techniques at the time of its establishment can still be vaguely discerned.