Songyang Academy 嵩阳书院

About Songyang Academy

Songyang Academy (嵩阳书院) is a Confucian academy at the southern foot of Mount Song (嵩山), about 3 km north of Dengfeng (登封) city in Henan, below Junji Peak (峻极峰) of Taishi Mountain (太室山). It is one of the Historic Monuments of Dengfeng in "The Centre of Heaven and Earth", inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2010.

The academy faces south with peaks on its east, north and west sides and the Shuangxi River (双溪河) in front. It started as Songyang Temple (嵩阳寺), a Buddhist temple founded in 484 under the Northern Wei, named for its position on the sunny side of Mount Song. In the Sui Daye years (605–618) it became a Taoist temple, Songyang Guan (嵩阳观). It was turned into a school under the Later Tang of the Five Dynasties and given the name Songyang Academy in 1035. The Southern Song scholar Wang Yinglin (王应麟) grouped it with the Bailudong (白鹿洞), Yuelu (岳麓) and Suiyang (睢阳) academies as the four great academies. The Neo-Confucian brothers Cheng Hao (程颢) and Cheng Yi (程颐) taught hundreds of students here.

War destroyed the buildings at the end of the Ming, and they were rebuilt under the Qing. Teaching stopped when the imperial examinations were abolished and replaced by modern schools in the late Qing. Pavilions that once stood in the surrounding valleys and hills have all been lost. The main compound largely keeps its Qing layout: 128 m north to south and 78 m east to west, with 26 Qing buildings, 15 carved stones from the Eastern Wei onward and 14 old trees. Five courtyards run along the axis, and every building except the hip-and-gable Daotong Shrine has a rolled-ridge, flush-gable roof in the local Henan style.

At the gate, a plaque copies Su Shi's (苏轼) calligraphy of the academy's name, framed by a couplet the Qianlong Emperor wrote on a visit in 1750. Inside, the halls hold a standing statue of Confucius, a lecture room furnished with desks and a wall painting of the Cheng brothers teaching, and, in the library, woodblocks and the Tang Empress Wu's Gold Tablet (唐武后金简), a rare find from the Mount Song area. Two ancient cypresses in the courtyard are said to have been named "General Cypresses" by Emperor Wu of Han in 110 BC.

What to look for

• The gate (大门), with a plaque copying Su Shi's calligraphy and the Qianlong Emperor's 1750 couplet
• Hall of the Former Sage (先圣殿), with a standing Confucius flanked by line engravings of Yanzi, Zisi, Zengzi and Mencius
• Lecture hall (讲堂), where Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi taught, set out with desks and a mural of the brothers lecturing
• Daotong Shrine (道统祠), with busts of the sage-kings Yao and Yu and the Duke of Zhou, and a crescent pool (泮池) crossed by an arched bridge in front
• The two-storey library (藏书楼), displaying Cheng-school texts, old printing blocks and the Tang Empress Wu's Gold Tablet
• The "General Cypresses" (将军柏), two ancient arborvitae; the one called the "Second General" is over 20 m tall
• The Great Tang stele of Songyang Guan (大唐嵩阳观纪圣德感应之颂碑), 9 m tall, carved in 744 with text by Li Linfu (李林甫) and script by Xu Hao (徐浩), just outside the gate

Location & getting there

Getting to Songyang Academy

• Search for 嵩阳书院 with 郑州市 and 登封市.