The Yungang Grottoes
By admin on 2015-01-14

The Yungang Grottoes, together with Longmen Grottoes, and Mogao Grottoes are the three major cave clusters in China. The Yungang Grottoes lie on the north cliff of Wuzhou Mountain, Datong. They occupy 1 km from east to west, and hold 53 caves and over 51,000 stone statues. There are three zones of the grottoes. Caves in the eastern parts are mainly made up of pagodas. Small and mid-sized niches are in the west caves. In addition, visitors can see many front and back chambers with Buddha status in the middle caves. All the walls and ceilings are covered by embossing. As excellent examples of rock-cut architecture, in 2001, the Yungang Grottoes became a UNESCO World Heritage Site. According to UNESCO, they are a "masterpiece of early Chinese Buddhist cave art...represent the successful fusion of Buddhist religious symbolic art from south and central Asia with Chinese cultural traditions."