It was located on the South
Bank of Yangtze River in Nanjing
Territory in China. This tower
was 260 feet high octagonal (with
eight corners) in shape with 97
feet in diameter. At the time
of its construction it was the
largest building in China.
The Porcelain Tower
(or Porcelain Pagoda) of Nanjing ,
also known as Bao'ensi (meaning "Temple
of Gratitude"), is a historical
site located on the south bank of
the Yangtze in Nanjing, China. It
was a pagoda constructed in the 15th
century during the Ming Dynasty, but
was mostly destroyed in the 19th century
during the course of the Taiping rebellion.
The tower is now under reconstruction.
Description
The original blocks of the Nanjing Tower's
arched door, now pieced back together
and on display at the Nanjing MuseumThe
tower was octagonal with a base of about
97 ft in diameter. When it was built,
the tower was one of the largest buildings
in China, rising up to a height of 260
feet with nine stories and a staircase
in the middle of the pagoda, which spiraled
upwards for 130 steps. The top of the
roof was marked by a golden sphere.
There were originally plans to add more
stories, according to an American missionary
who in 1852 visited Nanjing. There are
only a few Chinese pagodas that surpass
its height, such as the still existent
275 ft tall 11th-century Liaodi Pagoda
in Hebei or the non-existent 330 ft
tall 7th-century wooden pagoda of Chang'an.
The tower was built with
white porcelain bricks that were said
to reflect the sun's rays during the
day, and at night as many as 140 lamps
were hung from the building to illuminate
the tower. Glazes and stoneware were
worked into the porcelain and created
a mixture of green, yellow, brown and
white designs on the sides of the tower,
including animals, flowers and landscapes.
The tower was also decorated with numerous
Buddhist images.
History
The original blocks of the Nanjing Tower's
arched door, now pieced back together
and on display at the Nanjing MuseumThe
Porcelain Tower of Nanjing was designed
during reign of the Yongle Emperor (r.
1402-1424) shortly before its construction,
in the early 15th century. It was first
discovered by the Western world when
European travelers visited it, sometimes
listing it as one of the Seven Wonders
of the World. After this exposure to
the outside world, the tower was seen
as a national treasure to both locals
and other cultures around the world.
In 1801, the tower was
struck by lightning and the top three
stories were knocked off, but it was
soon restored. The 1843 book The Closing
Events of the Campaign in China by Granville
Gower Loch contains a detailed description
of the tower as it existed in the early
1840s. In the 1850s, the area surrounding
the tower erupted in civil war as the
Taiping Rebellion reached Nanjing and
the Taiping Rebels took over the city.
They smashed the Buddhist images and
destroyed the inner staircase to deny
the Qing enemy an observation platform.
American sailors reached the city in
May 1854 and visited the hollowed tower.
In 1856, the Taiping destroyed the tower
in order to prevent a hostile faction
from using it to observe and shell the
city. After this point, the tower's
remnants were forgotten and it lay dormant
until a recent surge to try and rebuild
the landmark.[2]
