The Yueyang Tower is located on the west bank of Dongting Lake in Yueyang City, Hunan Province. It was a military parade platform built by the Soochow general Lu Su during the Three Kingdoms period (215 AD) in order to fight against the Shu general Guan Yu who was stationed in Jingzhou. It was called the Yueyang Tower at the time. Military parade building. According to records, this is the earliest prototype of Yueyang Tower, and it is also the earliest pavilion built among the three famous towers in Jiangnan.
The existing Yueyang Tower was rebuilt in the fifth year of Guangxu of the Qing Dynasty (1879). It is located on the west wall of Yueyang, facing Dongting Lake and Junshan Mountain in the distance. The floor plan is rectangular, with three rooms on the front, surrounding corridors, three floors and three eaves, and a total height of nearly 20 meters. The roof is a four-sloped helmet roof with convex and concave roofs. It is the largest existing helmet roof building in China. It is covered with yellow glazed tiles and has high-rising wing corners. The left and right sides of the front of the building are juxtaposed with the word "Loupin", with Sanzui Pavilion and Xianmei Pavilion as foils. In the fourth year of Kaiyuan of the Tang Dynasty (716 AD), Zhongshu ordered Zhang Shuo to be demoted and banished to Yuezhou (today's Yueyang City). The following year, Zhang Shuo rebuilt a pavilion on the site of Lu Su's Yueyang Tower and officially named it Yueyang Tower.
In the fourth year of Qingli in the Northern Song Dynasty (AD 1044), minister Teng Zijing was ostracized and demoted to Yuezhou, so he rebuilt the Yueyang Tower. After it was completed, Teng Zijing asked Fan Zhongyan, a famous official and great writer at the time, to write a popular "Yueyang Tower", in which the line "worry about the world's worries first, and rejoice after the world's happiness" has been widely recited at home and abroad. Never fade. Yueyang Tower is also famous together with Fan Zhongyan's "Yueyang Tower". Therefore, there is a couplet about the Yueyang Tower in Hunan: "The lakes and mountains on all sides are within sight, and the joys and sorrows of all families are in their hearts."
Speaking of this "Yueyang Tower", there is another story. The first and second floors of the Yueyang Tower are each inlaid with a piece of "Yueyang Tower" carved in red sandalwood. But why should there be two inscriptions with the same article in one building? It is said that "The Story of Yueyang Tower" was written by Zhang Zhao, a great calligrapher during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. His calligraphy, carvings and high-quality wood are among the best in the world. Later, there was a local county magistrate who was good at calligraphy. In order to show himself and make himself famous through the Yueyang Tower and Fan Zhongyan's article, he imitated Zhang Zhao's handwriting and re-copied an article "Yueyang Tower". It is also engraved on a wooden board with the same texture. Even the size and shape of the font are exactly the same as Zhang Zhao's "Yueyang Tower". However, the engraver was dissatisfied with the county magistrate's behavior of substituting pillars and substituting pillars, and did not dare to disobey, so he deliberately carved the word "ju" in it very finely, which means "if you live high in the temple, you will worry about the people". It is distinguished from normal characters. The ambitious county magistrate took down Zhang Zhao's "Yueyang Tower" and replaced it with his own. Then he put Zhang Zhao's handwriting on the boat and tried to transport it elsewhere. Unexpectedly, when the boat was sailing into Dongting Lake, there was a strong wind and waves and the boat capsized in the lake. The county magistrate and the inscription "Yueyang Tower" written by Zhang Zhao both fell into the water, and the ambitious magistrate was drowned. During the subsequent dredging of Dongting Lake, people salvaged Zhang Zhao's "Yueyang Tower". Because it was carved on good wood, Zhang Zhao's handwriting was not greatly damaged by blisters. Since the handwriting of the two "Records of Yueyang Tower" by the county magistrate and Zhang Zhao are so similar that they can both be treasures of calligraphy, the two authentic and fake inscriptions of "Records of Yueyang Tower" are hung on the first and second floors of Yueyang Tower at the same time.
In addition, great writers such as Du Fu also wrote famous sentences about Yueyang Tower through the ages, including "Climbing Yueyang Tower", "In the past, I heard the water in Dongting, now I go up to Yueyang Tower. Wu and Chu are southeast, and the universe floats day and night. There are no relatives or friends. In one word, the old and sick have a lonely boat. The soldiers and horses pass through the north of the mountain, and Pingxuan Tisi flows."
Yueyang Tower is a national 5A-level scenic spot and a national key cultural relic protection unit.
The Yueyang Tower we saw is the only one with a wooden structure among the three famous towers in the south of the Yangtze River. After being rebuilt in the Qing Dynasty, it has survived more than a hundred years and decades of war without being destroyed. Although the height of the building is only 19.72 meters, which is much smaller than Tengwang Pavilion and Yellow Crane Tower, this ancient building standing on the edge of Dongting Lake can be said to be the only one of the three famous buildings in Jiangnan that was not rebuilt after the founding of the People's Republic of China. , and it is a pavilion that retains well-preserved ancient Chinese traditional architectural style.
The Yueyang Tower has four pillars and three floors, with cornices, a helmet top, and a pure wooden structure. Far away, it looks like a Kunpeng about to fly in the sky. The whole building is 25.35 meters high, rectangular in plan, 17.2 meters wide and 15.6 meters deep, covering an area of ??251 square meters. In the middle, four large nanmu columns with a diameter of 50 cm run straight through the roof of the building, carrying most of the weight of the building. Then 12 round wooden pillars are used to support the second floor, and 12 catalpa eaves pillars are used to support the eaves.
They restrain each other and form a whole. The beams, columns, purlins and rafters of the entire building are all connected by tenons and bite each other, making them as stable as a rock. The roof of Yueyang Tower is a helmet-top structure supported by stacked "Ruyi brackets". This arched and warped helmet-type top structure of ancient generals is unique in the history of ancient Chinese architecture.
"I saw Baling's magnificent appearance, a lake in Dongting. It holds distant mountains and swallows the Yangtze River. The vast water (shāngshāng) stretches endlessly; the sunrise and sunset are full of myriads of scenes. This is the Yueyang Tower. The grand view has been described by predecessors. "Wu Chu is in the southeast, and the universe floats day and night." When you climb up to the Yueyang Tower, you can see the waves of Dongting and the blue color of Junshan. The scenery is so vast and spectacular that predecessors have described it! The couplets of Yueyang Tower are the most exquisite among the three famous towers.
Fan Zhongyan's "Yueyang Tower" is the one that has been used the most, especially the sentence "Be worried about the world's worries first, and be happy after the world's happiness". It is not a neat couplet in itself, but there are many couplets that are. Its processed products:
With lakes and mountains on all sides, thousands of families are filled with joy and sorrow.
After spending a thousand years away from Lao Fan, we will be happy later and worry first. How many generations can take on the world's affairs? Covering 800 miles of Taihu Lake, traveling from south to north, Gu Fan was once the subject of the painting.
There are also those who use it in the opposite direction:
Lu Chunyang is too boring. Eight hundred miles of Dongting, flying here and there, who cares about a god? Fan Wenzheng was also a man of many things. Over the past few decades, what came before him and what came next was a matter of concern to everyone.
The long couplet of Yueyang Tower contains almost all the allusions related to this tower.
What’s so strange about the first floor? Du Shaoling's five-character swan song, Fan Xiwen's two-character poem about love, Teng Zijing's failure will make him prosperous, and Lu Chunyang's three faults will make him drunk. Poetry? Ruye? Official? Xianye? Not seeing the ancients before made me cry with sadness. Let’s take a look: Dongting Lake leads to Xiaoxiang in the south, Yangtze River leads to Wu Gorge in the north, Baling Mountain comes to the west, and Yuezhou City leads to the border cliff in the east. Zhu means, flows, stands, and suppresses. There is a true meaning in this. Who can understand it?
"Du Shaoling's Five-Character Song" refers to Du Fu's "Climbing the Yueyang Tower", which also contains very neat couplets describing the scene:
Wu Chu stands in the southeast, and the universe floats day and night. In the spring of the fourth year of Qingli, Teng Zijing was relegated to Baling County. In the next year, the government was well-connected and people were harmonious, and everything was restored. The Yueyang Tower was rebuilt, its old structure was added, and poems and poems by Tang Xian and modern people were engraved on it. It belongs to me to write down to record it. (Gu Tong: Ju)
I watched my husband Baling Shengsheng in a lake in Dongting. It carries distant mountains and swallows up the Yangtze River, which is a vast and boundless river. The sun shines brightly in the evening, and the scenery is endless. This is the grand view of Yueyang Tower, which has been described by predecessors. However, it is connected to Wu Gorge in the north and Xiaoxiang in the South Pole. Many foreigners and poets gather here, and the feeling of looking at the things is the same.
If the rain is falling, the moon is not open, the wind is howling, and the turbid waves are rowing. The sky is empty; the sun and stars are dim, and the mountains are invisible; business travel cannot be carried out, and the rafts are toppled and destroyed; the dusk is dim, and the tigers roar and the apes crow. When climbing the tower, there are those who are nostalgic for their country, worried about slander and fear of ridicule, their eyes are full of desolation, and they feel extremely sad. (Yin Yao's first work: Yin Yao)
It is like spring and the scenery is bright, the waves are calm, the sky above and below is a vast expanse of blue; sand gulls gather in the sky, and the golden scales swim; the shore is covered with orchids, lush and green. Or when the long smoke disappears, the bright moon shines thousands of miles away, the floating light leaps into the gold, the silent shadow sinks into the jade, and the fishermen answer each other's songs, how wonderful is this joy! When you climb the tower, you will feel relaxed and happy, forgetting your favors and disgrace together, drinking wine in the wind, and you will be overjoyed.
Sigh! I try to seek the benevolent heart of the ancients, or do it differently from the two, why? Don't be happy with things, don't be sad with yourself; if you live high in a temple, you worry about its people; if you live far away in the rivers and lakes, you worry about your king. It means that you are worried when you advance, and you are also worried when you retreat. But when will you be happy? Surely it must be said, "Be worried about the worries of the world first, and be happy after the joys of the world"? Alas! Weisi people, who can I return to?
It was September 15th, six years ago.