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Zhanyuan Garden

The Zhanyuan is the only best preserved garden from the Ming Dynasty in Nanjing and one of the Four Great Gardens in the Southern Yangtze River area (the other three are Jichang, Humble Administration and Lingering Gardens). It is more than 600 years old. "Zhanyuan" is derived from a poem written by the prominent poet Ouyang Xiu (1007 - 1072), in which a line runs "one feels like in heaven when looking up ('zhan' in Chinese) the beautiful house". The Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty loved the poem much, so he christened the garden.

The Zhanyuan Garden was the residence of the man of great merit in establishing the Ming Empire, Xu Da. It had been expanded in later history. During the Qing Dynasty, the garden became the office house of the imperial government and Qianlong stayed here for a short period. In the time of the rebellious Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, the Zhanyuan Garden was the residence of a rebel leader. The garden was badly burnt during the capture of Nanjing by the Qing forces. Through two times of renovation and repair in 1865 and 1903, so the Zhanyuan Garden is different from the original. Again in 1958 and 1985, the Nanjing municipal government has renewed and expanded the garden respectively.

Today the Zhanyuan Garden maintains the layout and style of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, with the adoption of a little bit of the technique in modern gardening. Vast verdant bush and tall bamboo areas make the garden like a tiny forest. In the eastern part, interesting places are the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Museum, the Grassland and the Ancient Architecture Area, while in the west, magnificent rockwork and the old Jingmiao Hall. These attractions have made the Zhanyuan Garden a pearl of the sightseeing area around the Confucius Temple in Nanjing.

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