历史名城张掖位于丝绸之路河西走廊中途，东邻武威和金昌，西临酒泉。张掖旅游资源丰富，其中最有名的旅游景点是大佛寺、木塔寺和鼓楼。张掖大佛寺位于张掖市西南隅，建于西夏崇宗永安元年。

The historic city of Zhangye is located in the midway of the Hexi Corridor along the Silk Road, bordering Wuwei and Jinchang on the east and Jiuquan on the west. It had a long history. In 121BC, it was first established as a prefecture in Gansu after Emperor Wudi of the Han dynasty sent General Huo qubing on a victorious expedition against the Xiongnu (hun). One of the four ancient prefectures at west of the Yellow River in Gansu, Zhangye served as a political, economic, and cultural center, as well as a center for diplomatic activities in northwest China through the ages. Zhangye is rich in tourism resources, and the best-known tourist attractions are Giant Buddha Temple, Wooden Pagoda Temple and Drum Tower.

The centerpiece of Zhangye is the mysterious Giant Buddha Temple. Located in the southwest corner of Zhangye in Gansu Province, the Giant Buddha Temple is the largest architectural relic in Gansu Province of the Western Xia (1038-1227) period. China’s largest reclining Buddha is well preserved in this temple. The Zhangye museum is located here.

According to archeological researches, this temple was built during the Western Xia period and revamped many times during the Ming and Qing dynasties. A legend tells that a chancellor named Wei Mie of the Western Xia period ordered workers to dig into the ground to 1 to 1.3 meters deep to carve a reclining Buddha to be covered with glazed color tiles. This Temple was built in 1098 to house the Buddha. During its 900 years, the main hall that houses the giant Buddha was restored many times during the Qianlong reign (1736-1795) of the Qing dynasty.

The existing complex consists of the Giant Buddha Hall, the Buddhist Classics Hall, and a Clay Pagoda. The two-storied Giant Buddha Hall is 33 meters high, 49 meter wide and 24 meters long, with a total area of 1770 square meters. The gold-plated and painted giant Buddha, a clay sculpture of Sakyamuni with a wooden skeleton, lies in the state of nirvana in the middle of the hall. The whole sculpture is made of wood and clay and is gilded and painted. It is 34.5 meters long and 7.5 meters wide between its two shoulders, with feet of 4 meters and ears of 2 meters. The sculpture is exquisite, well-proportioned. Its calm expression and natural looking moves visitors. Behind the Sleeping Buddha are his ten disciples, and on two sides stand eighteen arhats, each with a different expression and manner. The walls of the upper and lower floors are covered with painted murals, totaling about 530 square meters. Apart from some pictures of the Buddha’s warrior attendants, most of these murals depict Buddhist stories and episodes from the Mountain-sea Sutra (an ancient Chinese encyclopedia) and from Journey to the West (a classic Chinese mythological novel written in Ming dynasty). All these murals add to the grandeur of the temple.

It is said that the Bieji Queen (a famous queen of the Yuan dynasty) once lived in the Giant Buddha Temple, giving birth to Kublai khan there. The Italian traveler Marco Polo, impressed by the magnificent architecture of the Giant Buddha Temple and by the prosperity of Zhangye city, lived here for more than one year.

In the Buddhist Classics Hall, there are more than 6000 tomes of lectures, some of which, written in gold and silver, are the rarest and most precious.

The clay pagoda, one of the five elements pagodas in Zhangye, has 13 stories, on the first and second stories of which are four miniature pagodas, a feature rarely seen in other pagodas.

Magnificent, mysterious, and unique, the Giant Buddha Temple belongs on every visitor’s itinerary.

Mural Tombs of the Wei and Jin Period

These tombs are scattered in 20 kilometers northeast of Jiayuguan. In a barren section on the outer limits of the Gobi Desert, lies the Xincheng Prefecture, within which is contained the Xincheng Wei-Jin art gallery (xincheng weijin mu).The gallery actually containing two tombs, although known to all for quite a while, were not infiltrated until 1972.Within this area, a large stretch between Jiayuguan and Jiuquan, there is a big tomb group with over 1400 tombs built between 220AD and 419AD. During the Wei and Jin dynasties, this area is not overly tourist-filled which makes it one of the nicer trips from the town.

This is known as the largest subterranean art gallery in the world, housing a great deal of colorful murals on its cold stone walls. The gallery has attracted tourists from both home and abroad since 1972 when it was excavated. Most tombs are familial ones, housing bodies of three or four generations, and currently only Tomb 6 and Tomb 7 are open to the public.

Entering the cold stone tomb, you will marvel at the special layout inside and the vivid murals. Each Wei-Jin tomb generally has two or three chambers which are connected by corridors paved with tiles in diverse flower patterns. The corridors and caves of the tombs are filled with interesting sights: the walls and gates are decorated with delicate patterns and easy lines symbolizing cloud, water, fire, gods and weird animals. Among the excavated tombs, six have murals composed of 600 pieces. Except for a few large ones, most of the murals are one-brick murals. The exquisite murals on the inner chamber walls tell the master and mistress’s contemporary routine life, their various entourages and servant’s hard working. They mainly depict farming, mulberry culture, animal husbandry, water fetching, hunting, gardening, opening up wasteland, barracks, cooking, dancing, chess, cattle, clothing, and household utensils. Others, however, also reflect the political, cultural, military, and scientific development of the Wei and Jin dynasties, an insight into this ancient Chinese feudal society.

Mainly painted realistically and earlier than Mogao grottoes, Wei-Jin art gallery is especially important for the study of the origins of grotto art and provides an example of unmixed Chinese realism art, filling in gaps in the fields of painting between the Wei and Jin periods, and so it is considered highly valuable for historic research.