South Guanyin Cave

The two sister Guanyin Caves, located in the south and north of Yuhuang Mountain, are the Guanyin caves that uniquely display Buddhist culture in Hangzhou. Nanguanyin Cave is located in the south of Yuhuang Mountain and at the southwest foothills of Jiangtai Mountain. On the east side of the south entrance of the current Yuhuangshan Tunnel, there is Jingsheng Courtyard in front of the cave. Because the back mountain of Yuhuang Mountain has a stone protruding like a dragon's head, there are two dragons up and down, the upper stone dragon is in Yongshouyuan (now where the Ciyunling stone statue is), and the lower stone dragon is in Jingshengyuan, so Jingshengyuan is also called Xia. Shilongyuan (nunnery). This is a peaceful and pleasant natural cave, about 3 meters high and 3 meters deep. Eighteen Arhat statues are carved on the rock walls on both sides of the cave. Although the Buddha statues are less than half a meter tall, the layout is natural and interesting. On the top of the eighteen Arhat statues, there are also statues of Guanyin, Manjusri, Puxian Bodhisattva and Monk Jigong. Walking to the bottom of the cave, you can see the statues of Guanyin Bodhisattva and Wei Shi. From the perspective of the style of these statues, they should have been carved in the Southern Song Dynasty. Because of the mud and gold of the descendants of the pilgrims, they have changed beyond recognition. Judging from the remaining inscriptions, the dates of the statues include the first year of Kaixi in the Southern Song Dynasty (1205 AD), the first year of Jiading (1208 AD), and the seventh year of Hongzhi in the Ming Dynasty (1494 AD), etc., indicating that the statue of Nanguanyin Cave was in Carving began after the Southern Song Dynasty moved the capital to Hangzhou (then called Lin'an Fu) and continued until the Ming Dynasty. Compared with the stone dragon cave statues in the same period, its artistic value is slightly less. The Jingsheng Courtyard (Xia Shilong Courtyard) in front of Nanguanyin Cave has long ceased to exist. The Nanguanyin Cave is still the same. Part of the site of Jingshengyuan has become the roadbed of Nanfu Road, and the other part has become a small temple with two Buddhist halls, dedicated to Guanyin and other Bodhisattvas. At the beginning of the month, half of the month and the birthday of Guanyin Bodhisattva, pilgrims fill the door and cigarettes are lingering, which reminds people of the splendid scene of incense in Jingshengyuan (Xiashilongyuan) in the Southern Song Dynasty 700 years ago.