"Black technology" was discovered in Shanxi Hanging Temple, and the expansion screw has a history of thousands of years. What happened?

The five mountains bear the pride and pride of the Chinese nation. In Datong City, Shanxi Province, Mount Hengshan stands tall.

Between the steep cliffs of Cuiping Peak on the west side of Jinlong Gorge in Hengshan Mountain, there is a veritable first scenic spot in Hengshan Mountain. It is an ancient temple that has stood for thousands of years-Hanging Temple.

Hanging Temple remains stable in extreme geographical environment, which makes people feel both wonderful and mysterious.

When people walked into this thousand-year-old temple and studied its architectural structure, they accidentally discovered The Secret Behind's "black technology"-expansion screw in the suspended temple.

What is the magic of the Hanging Temple? Where is the ancient expansion screw sacred, and how did it support the Hanging Temple to stand for thousands of years?

"Standing on the side of China, guarding Gong Shenjing", Mount Hengshan in Beiyue stands in the Jin area with its magnificent heroic posture, guarding the land of China.

According to the Book of History, during Qin Shihuang's east tour, he praised the vastness of Mount Hengshan with his magnificent words: "Taihang Mountain, Mount Hengshan, as for Jieshi, entering the sea".

Among the Hengshan Mountains, eighteen scenes have their own characteristics, all of which are wonderful. Among them, the Jinlongxia valley is deep, the cliffs stand tall and the throats cross, which adds to the steep terrain. Located in the west of Jinlong Gorge, Cuiping Peak is connected by more than ten peaks, just like a green barrier, hence its name.

In Jin Yong's famous novel the legendary swordsman, Ling Huchong, the hero, visited Hengshan Mountain with Zheng Fang, a martial arts expert, and Xu Chong, a Taoist priest, and came to the foot of Cuiping Peak.

"Looking up, I saw two flying pavilions standing on the top of the mountain, like a fairy pavilion, and now they have entered the clouds." The castle inside is the famous hanging temple at home and abroad.

Kong Xuan Temple, also known as Kong Xuan Temple, was built in the late Northern Wei Dynasty with a history of 1500 years. It is an extremely rare "three religions in one" building in China, and this cultural connotation is unparalleled in the whole architectural history.

/kloc-a small platform of more than 0/50 square meters, 40 halls, covering Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, forming the main layout of "one hospital and two floors".

Among them, the South Building is dominated by Taoist architecture, including Chunyang Palace and Sanguan Hall, among which Chunyang Palace is dedicated to Lv Dongbin, one of the Eight Immortals.

Sanguan Temple is the largest building in the whole hanging temple complex, which is dedicated to celestial officials, local officials and water officials.

Kong Xuan Temple, also known as the "Xuan" of Kong Xuan Temple, also comes from the Taoist concept that "Xuan is both mysterious and the gate of Wan Qi".

The north building is dominated by Buddhist architecture, including the Five Buddhas Hall and Guanyin Hall.

The Five Buddhas Hall is named after its dedication to Five Dhyani Buddhas, while the Guanyin Hall is dedicated to Guanyin Bodhisattva. There are many large and small Buddha statues in the temple, which are ingenious and lifelike.

Sanjiao Temple is the most representative building in the Hanging Temple. It is not only the highest point of the whole building complex, but also a place dedicated to Sakyamuni, Laozi and Confucius, the founders of Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism.

It vividly conveys the spiritual concept of the unity of the three religions in the Hanging Temple, making the Hanging Temple stand out among the many temples left over from ancient China.

According to legend, in 398 AD, the Northern Wei Dynasty established its capital in today's Datong City. Before his death, the leader Kou left his last words, calling for the construction of an aerial temple, so as to achieve the realm of "flying down from heaven" and provide a place for all people in the world to practice.

Another legend points out the reason why the Hanging Temple hangs in the air. It is said that after the capital was established in the Northern Wei Dynasty, the Emperor of the Northern Wei Dynasty wanted to promote religious ideas and integrate people's beliefs by building unique temples.

He believes that only by building the temple in mid-air can we show the piety of faith and talk to the gods walking in the clouds.

No matter which legend is true, these stories reflect the unique historical background when the Hanging Temple was built.

During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Buddhism was introduced into China, attracting a large number of believers. Long before Buddhism was introduced, Confucianism and Taoism, which originated in China, also had a deep-rooted foundation and occupied an important position in people's minds.

During the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the open and inclusive ideological and cultural atmosphere enabled these religions to develop.

Although the three beliefs have different connotations, they have achieved harmonious coexistence and peace in an open environment, and have been intuitively presented through architectural entities such as the Hanging Temple.

For thousands of years, countless religious buildings have been destroyed in wars between military strategists. Although the Hanging Temple is located in the geographical artery, because it embodies the spirit of eclecticism, it has been sincerely respected and cared for by people throughout the ages, and has been carefully repaired and maintained throughout the ages. It has never been destroyed and has survived as an architectural miracle for thousands of years.

Since ancient times, countless tourists who come here have left amazing words after witnessing the charm of the Hanging Temple.

The poet Li Bai once wrote the word "spectacular" on the boulder under the temple;

Xu Xiake, a Ming Dynasty traveler, also praised this temple as a "grand view of the world".

Approaching the Hanging Temple with awe of the ancients, this unique temple is cleverly inlaid on the cliffs like a relief.

The whole temple building is a wooden frame structure, which skillfully combines the beam structure with the mountain.

Because it is built on a steep cliff, the scale of the Hanging Temple is not large, and the whole temple is only 152.5 square meters.

However, in such a limited space, there are 40 houses, including temples, meditation rooms, Buddhist temples, Taiyi Temple, Guandi Temple, Songzi Guanyin Hall and Chunyang Palace. It can be said that "the sparrow is small and complete."

The beauty of the hanging temple lies in the word "hanging". "Hanging Temple, half a day high, with three ponytails hanging in the air", shows how dangerous it looks and how clever its design is.

The 40 temples in the whole temple are not firmly located on the ground like conventional buildings. The bottom of these buildings is connected with the rock wall by more than a dozen wooden pillars with thick bowls, so that they hang in the air with their backs against the cliffs.

Whenever there are clouds in the mountains, the wooden pillars disappear from sight, and the hanging temple is like a building that grows out of thin air on a cliff, adding a bit of mystery.

Among the 40 halls, the most famous one is Sanjiao Hall. It is located at the top of the third part of the Hanging Temple, which is the highest altitude in the temple.

In the early days of construction, the Sanjiao Temple was 90 meters above the ground, but the surface has risen for thousands of years under the siltation of rivers and sand. So far, Sanjiao Temple is 58 meters above the ground, as high as 20 stories.

Since the temple was built, it has changed for thousands of years, and countless pavilions and pavilions have collapsed in the wind and rain and become historical relics.

And this seemingly most fragile and dangerous hanging temple has withstood thousands of years of wind, frost, rain and snow, and has always stood in Hengshan.

The existence of the Hanging Temple can be said to be a miracle in the history of architecture. It can not only maintain an amazing height from the ground hanging between cliffs, but also maintain stability for thousands of years, which is a miracle in the history of architecture.

So what kind of ancient "black technology" makes this temple maintain eternal vitality under such a daunting appearance?

The hanging temple has been preserved so far, not only because of its magical architectural structure, but also because of the inspection and maintenance of craftsmen in previous dynasties.

After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the Hanging Temple was selected as the second batch of national key protected cultural relics as a historical relic, and it is also a key protected cultural relic in Shanxi Province. Every year, thousands of tourists come to the Hanging Temple to find out, and its high popularity also makes it highly valued by the state.

Hanging Temple is a wooden structure as a whole, and the wooden material is the least resistant to wind and rain erosion and moth-eaten, so it needs regular inspection and maintenance.

In the 1990s, Shanxi Province organized architectural experts to overhaul the Hanging Monastery, trying to find out potential safety hazards and avoid sightseeing accidents.

Experts climbed all over the temple building. During the inspection, they found that some rungs in the corridor on the west side of Hangkong Temple had potential safety hazards.

These rungs have been deformed under the wind and rain, and even there are traces of moth-eaten corrosion. If they are not replaced in time, they may be in danger of rupture.

After some discussion, the maintenance personnel decided to replace these crosspieces with new crosspieces as a whole and started the demolition work.

However, what everyone didn't expect was that the removal of several boards was extremely difficult. According to experience, these boards need the help of several people to pull out. However, several staff members made great efforts, but the board of directors remained motionless.

Experts are puzzled. On the surface, the rungs are all ordinary boards with no clue.

At this point, cracks have faintly appeared in the main body of the crosspiece, and the replacement work can no longer be delayed. Because of the unshakable manpower, the experts found a long saw and tried to cut the rung open.

The wooden crosspiece naturally lost to the hacksaw. After the crosspiece was sawed off, the experts were surprised to find that the crossbeam was still firmly embedded in the crosspiece, and the whole structure could not be separated. This greatly hindered the demolition work.

Experts carefully observed the place where the beam was embedded, and even cut some wood blocks at the embedded place for research. They saw that the access of the beam was covered with traces of artificial inverted teeth and axe chopping, and the gap was filled with wooden wedges.

"This is an expansion screw!"

After an expert involuntarily shouted out this technical term, everyone immediately realized that this is the principle of expansion screws!

Expansion screw is a widely used technology in modern architecture. It consists of a screw and an expansion pipe of the sea shell. When the nut is tightened, the screw moves the conical part through the axial movement of the thread, so that a great positive pressure is formed on the outer peripheral surface of the expansion pipe, and friction self-locking is formed among the wall, the expansion pipe and the screw, thus realizing the fixing function.

Simply put, the principle of expansion screw is to use the wedge-shaped inclined plane to generate the maximum friction force, so that the fixing effect is continuously increased and the connection of buildings is more firm and reliable.

In modern buildings, the commonly used expansion screws are all metal. Although the materials of the expansion screws in Hangkong Temple are different, the structural principles adopted are completely consistent with those in modern times, and they also have the function of stabilizing the building structure.

Expansion screws make full use of the structural combination of small components in use. This splicing method of building materials is widely used in the tenon-mortise structure in ancient China. It can be said that the expansion screw is a well-deserved invention of our ancestors.

It is conceivable that more than a thousand years ago, faced with the special geographical environment of the Hanging Temple, the ancients had a whim and came up with a method to expand the screws. They found that there was no support point on the cliff, so they pried the beam open with a wedge when placing it, so that the inverted teeth of the beam were tightly stuck with the cave. The deeper the wedge, the tighter the beam is clamped.

In this way, the beam is tightly embedded in the stone wall, even if the outside is eroded by wind and rain or even sawed off by a hacksaw, it will not affect its internal stability at all.

This architectural skill seems commonplace today, but for the ancients thousands of years ago, it was as magical as "black technology". It is also the widespread use of this "black technology" that makes the wooden frames of the Hanging Temple firmly connected with each other, so that the whole temple can resist natural erosion and always remain stable and firm.

In addition to the expansion screw, the most typical "black technology", experts also found the embryonic form of other modern building technologies in the Hanging Temple.

The tenon-mortise structure widely exists in the wooden joint of the hanging temple, which not only saves the cost, but also improves the stability of the building.

In addition, in order to reduce the pressure of flying beams as supports, statues are lightweight Buddha statues, not made of stone.

The discovery of "black technology" in many buildings completely surprised the experts who came to carry out maintenance work. They seem to have found the door to the treasure house of ancient architectural skills, not only glimpsed the magical skills of ancient craftsmen, but also obtained important materials for studying ancient architectural technologies.

Hanging Temple is no longer just a name of "Hanging Temple", but has become a model of ancient architecture in China.

The Millennium Hanging Temple was surprised by the expansion screw, and the discovery of this building "black technology" made the architectural value of the Hanging Temple stand out.

In addition to the magnificent appearance and exquisite architectural skills, the cultural wealth left by the Hanging Temple is worth cherishing.

Thousands of years ago, this temple presented the architectural purpose of coexistence of three religions, representing the cultural concept of pluralism and tolerance, and embodying the open mind of the ancients.

Visiting the Hanging Temple, let's pay tribute to the ancients who have "black technology" and to our precious architectural treasures and cultural attractions.

China HowNet: Shanxi Hangkong Temple