Damagou Little Buddha Temple

Shanghai Expo 2010 Yangtze River Cruise Tibet Tours Shanghai Tours China Hotels

Recently, world’s least ancient Buddha temple ruin museum has been formally opened in Hetian of Xinjiang. In order to protect the world’s least ancient temple, this themed museum was built and opened. The archeologist expressed the construction of this relic museum dedicates a lot to revivification of history of Xinjiang and research to the development history of local ethnics as well as the religious evolution. Roughly 8 years ago, this little Buddha temple was discovered by a little herd-boy in Damagou area(达玛沟) of Kele County, and in 2002 it was ranked one of China Top 10 Archeological Discoveries.

Little Buddha Temple faces south and backs on north with a total area of 4 square meters. In temple, there is a clay-made Buddha statue with a lotus seat, the head and hands of the statue were ruined. The frescos in temple are perfectly great. This little Buddha temple roughly was built during the period of south and north dynasties, approximately 1500 years’ history. Currently, it is the smallest size ancient temple, and also the only temple with the best-preserved and largest temple frescoes discovered in Taklimakan Desert Area.

Wu Xinhua, the excavator of this little temple and the team head of Xinjiang Archeological Team subordinated to Archeological Institute of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences said this discovery offered first-hand materials and resources to study the Buddhist arts in Xinjiang area.