Longmen (Dragon's Gate) Caves is an Unesco World Heritage site. It is located 9 miles south of the city of Luoyang and can be easily accessed by taxi or city bus. The carvings of Buddhas on the lime cliffs along the west bank of the Yi River begun around AD 494. These carvings cover a history of over 500 years. 2300 caves have survived and 110,000 statues, large and small ( from 56ft to a couple of inches)have been catalogued. Thousands of these Buddhas have missing heads and hands. Western art collectors in the early 20th century raided these caves and many of these artifacts are now on display in major museums around the world.

Except for the large sign just inside the entrance gate, explaining why some of the statues have missing heads and hands and the museums that have them on display. There are few signs to help the foreign visitors.

But the caves are laid out in major clusters reflecting successive periods of construction. Also these caves are not deep as centuries of erosion, flooding and earthquakes have exposed most of the large figures to the sky. so that they can be viewed easily from each entrance.

The Wanfo Don (cave of ten thousand buddhas) is the most magnificent. There are 15000 small buddhas carved into the walls of the cave. The ceiling is decorated with a single vast lotus flower inscribed with the date of its carving AD 680. Each of the 54 lotuses on the back wall has a bodhisattva figure in the middle.

The Buddha sits at the center of the cave on a lotus throne, its panels stamped and carved in the 10,000 buddha pattern with seated musicians below and a dancer in swirling silks. At the entrance of this cave is a headless statue of the Guanyin, goddess of mercy.
The site is very pleasant and the best time to visit is late fall to early winter. The summers are hot and humid and there are dust storms in the spring.

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taxi or local bus from Luoyang

Last edited on Nov 11, 09 11:34 PM.
Contributors: Christie Show History

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Christie

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Lena C.

Nov 2, 2008

The caves are very interesting and beautiful. A great place to spend a couple of hours and reflect on the artistic abilities of the thousands of workers who worked on these caves so many centuries ago.

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Christie

Oct 4, 2008

Amazing place to spend half a day wandering around, where you can see thousands of Buddha statues carved directly into the mountains alongside the river.

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