Jinghai Temple & Tianfei Palace

Jinghai Temple

The Jinghai Temple, located at the southwestern foot of the Lion Hill, was first built in the 9th year (1411) of the Yongle reign of the Ming Dynasty. It was built by the order of Emperor Chengzu in praise of Eunuch Zheng He for his merits in his navigation to the Western Oceans. The temple was given the name of Jinghai by the emperor, meaning all seas were calm or praying for the peace. At the initial building time, the temple occupied a space of about 2 hectares and consisted of 80 different halls. Zheng He lived in the temple to spend his later years once, and the rare and precious plants brought back from his voyages to the Western Oceans were grown in the temple. In the 43rd year (1516) of the Jiajing reign of the Ming Dynasty, Li Shizhen – a famous pharmacologist of traditional Chinese medicine, lived in the temple to examine the pharmaceutical plants brought back by Zheng He, and added some to his Compendium of Materia Medica, called Bencao Gangmu in Chinese. In the 22nd year (1842) of the Daoguang reign of the Qing Dynasty, the fire of the Opium War forced the Qing government to agree to negotiate with the British force in the Jinghai Temple, and then signed the Nanjing Treaty--the first unequal treaty in the modern history of China.

The Jinghai Temple experienced war fires and saw its ruin and repair many times. In 1937, The Japanese aggression troops set fire on the temple and only 8 monk rooms remained after the fire. The "Old Site of the Ruined Jinghai Temple" was rebuilt in 1987. And in 1990, it was developed to be the exhibition hall of showing historical materials about the Nanjing Treaty and began to open to visitors. The "Old Site of the Ruined Jinghai Temple" received expansion in 1996 to meet the return of Hong Kong to China and an "Alarm Bell" was casted. In June 1997, the exhibition hall of the historical materials about the Nanjing Treaty was named by the publicity ministry of the CPC as one of "One Hundred Nationwide Model Bases for Patriotic Education in China". The temple was enlarged once more in 2004 and occupies an area of 12,000 square meters.

Tianfei Temple

In the fifth year (1407) of the reign of Yongle Emperor of the Ming Dynasty, when Eunuch Zheng He succeeded in returning from his first voyage to the Western Oceans, Emperor Chengzu ordered to build the "Longjiang Tianfei Palace" at the foot of the Lion Hill, expressing thanks to Tianfei, also called as Queen of the Heaven, or Goddess of the Seven Seas, for her blessing and protection of the safe navigation of the fleet over the oceans. In the 14th year (1416) of his reign, Zhu Di inscribed the "Imperially-built Tablet of Hongren Puji Tainfei Palace" on a tablet for the palace. According to records, "the Tainfei Palace consists of 79 front and back halls and other houses, with a surrounding outer wall of more than 630 meters in length." The palace was damaged several times after the reign of Xianfeng Emperor (1851-1862) of the Qing Dynasty. In the winter of 1937 when Japanese occupied Nanjing, the Tainfei Palace was ruined once more in the fire of war, with only the tablet remaining. The tablet was moved into the Jinghai Temple when the "Old Site of Ruined Jinghai Temple" was expanded in 1996. To commemorate the 600th anniversary of Zheng He’s voyages to the Western Oceans, Nanjing Tianfei Palace was rebuilt, with the plan to have a space of 17,000 square meters and about 5,000 square meters as floor area. The first phase of construction was finished in May 2005 and the new palace began to be open to visitors very soon. With 2,688 square meters, the new construction has restored the magnificent manner of the former Longjiang Tianfei Palace in the Ming Dynasty and become the holy place to attract people from home and abroad to come here to pray for the happiness.