Shaoxing's Dafo Temple, known for its 'Dongdu Dunhuang' reputation

Dafo Temple is located on Nanming Street in Xinchang County, Shaoxing City, Zhejiang Province, and was founded during the Eastern Jin Dynasty. The temple is characterized by its stone cave sculptures, with grand Buddha statues and a long history. It houses a stone Maitreya Buddha that has stood for over 1,600 years, measuring 16.3 meters in height and 10.6 meters between its knees. It is the only remaining early stone cave sculpture in southern China and is hailed as the 'Dongdu Dunhuang'. Liu Xie, a literary theorist of the Southern Dynasties, praised it as 'a treasure beyond compare, a peerless endeavor'. In 1983, the Xinchang Dafo Temple was designated by the State Council as a national key temple for Han Chinese Buddhism. In 2006, the temple was listed as a key cultural relic protection unit in Zhejiang Province. In 2013, the stone Maitreya Buddha and the Thousand Buddha Rock sculptures of Dafo Temple became national key cultural relics protection units. Dafo Temple is a large-scale, multi-functional, comprehensive national 4A-level tourist attraction that integrates sightseeing, pilgrimage, geological science popularization, folk experience, and Zen leisure. It boasts national brands such as a national scenic area, national geological park, national key cultural relics protection unit, national key open temple, and a CCTV film and television shooting base.