Yungang Grottoes: Colossal Buddhas of the Northern Wei Dynasty

The Yungang Grottoes are a group of Buddhist cave temples carved into the sandstone cliffs of Wuzhou Mountain near Datong, in China’s Shanxi province. Begun around AD 460 under the Northern Wei dynasty at the urging of the monk Tanyao, they contain colossal Buddhas and more than 51,000 statues. Yungang is one of the three great early Buddhist cave sites of China, with Mogao and Longmen, and marks the moment when Buddhist art became an imperial project in northern China.

Background: the Northern Wei

The Northern Wei was founded in 386 by the Tuoba clan of the Xianbei, a people from the northern steppe frontier. It rose after the collapse of the Former Qin following the Battle of Fei River in 383. In 398 the Tuoba ruler made Pingcheng, near modern Datong, his capital, and by 439 the Northern Wei had united northern China.

Buddhism had been spreading in China for several centuries, carried along the Silk Road through oasis towns such as Dunhuang, where the Mogao Caves were begun in 366. The Northern Wei court valued Buddhist monks as advisers. The monk Faguo, an early leader of the clergy, taught that the emperor was “the present-day Tathagata”, that is, a living Buddha, so that honouring the ruler and honouring the Buddha became the same act.

Persecution and restoration

The relationship broke down under Emperor Taiwu (r. 424–452). Influenced by the minister Cui Hao and the Daoist master Kou Qianzhi, and angered by the discovery of weapons in a monastery during a rebellion, he ordered a sweeping persecution of Buddhism in 446. Temples, images and scriptures were destroyed and monks were forced to return to lay life or were killed.

After Taiwu was murdered in 452, his grandson Emperor Wencheng restored Buddhism the same year. The monk Tanyao, who had survived the persecution, was appointed head of the monastic community. According to the Book of Wei, Tanyao proposed carving five caves in the cliffs west of the capital, each with a huge Buddha image. Stone monuments, unlike wooden temples and bronze statues, could not easily be destroyed, so the caves were also a guarantee that the faith would survive any future persecution.

The Tanyao caves

The five caves, now numbered 16 to 20, were probably begun around 460, in the Heping era (460–465). Each is an oval chamber dominated by a single colossal figure. Most scholars believe the five Buddhas represent five Northern Wei rulers, from the founder Emperor Daowu to Wencheng himself, although which statue stands for which ruler is debated.

The most famous image is the seated Buddha of Cave 20, about 13.7 metres high. The front wall of the cave collapsed long ago, at a date that is uncertain, leaving the figure in the open air, where it has become the symbol of Yungang. Its broad shoulders, firm features and robe draped over one shoulder show influences from the art of Gandhara and Mathura in South Asia and from Central Asian Buddhist centres.

The middle and late phases

A second phase, from about 471 to 494, coincided with the reign of Emperor Xiaowen and the regency of his step-grandmother, the Empress Dowager Feng. Caves in this period were often built as pairs, such as Caves 5 and 6, 7 and 8, and 9 and 10. Cave 5 holds a seated Buddha about 17 metres high, the largest at Yungang. Cave 6 has a central pagoda-pillar and walls covered with carved scenes from the life of the Buddha.

Middle-period caves show growing Chinese elements: figures in Chinese robes, carved roofs and brackets imitating timber halls, and orderly rows of niches. Painted colours, now mostly faded or repainted in later centuries, once covered much of the stone.

In 494 Emperor Xiaowen moved the capital south to Luoyang as part of his programme of adopting Chinese customs. Imperial patronage moved with him to the new cave site at Longmen. At Yungang, smaller caves and niches paid for by local officials and families continued until about 525, after which work largely stopped.

Art and style

Yungang’s sculpture is a meeting point of several traditions. The earliest figures have heavy, rounded bodies, almond-shaped eyes and thin robes clinging to the body, features linked to the Buddhist art of Gandhara, Mathura and the Gupta period in India, transmitted through the kingdoms of Central Asia. The Book of Wei records that monks from Sri Lanka and Central Asia visited the Northern Wei court, and craftsmen deported from the conquered Northern Liang state in Gansu in 439 are thought to have brought skills and models with them.

Later figures change markedly. Bodies become slimmer and flatter, and Buddhas wear layered Chinese robes with long, cascading folds. This “Sinicised” style, associated with Emperor Xiaowen’s reforms, became standard at Longmen and across northern China in the early 6th century.

The carvings are not only of Buddhas. Walls are covered with bodhisattvas, flying celestial beings (apsaras), musicians playing harps, lutes and drums, guardian figures, lotus flowers and borders of flame and vine. Scenes from the Buddha’s life and earlier lives, carved in narrative panels, were meant to instruct worshippers who walked through the caves. Inscriptions left by donors, though fewer than at Longmen, help date some of the later niches.

By the numbers

Key people

• Tanyao: monk and head of the Buddhist clergy who proposed the first five caves.
• Emperor Taiwu (r. 424–452): launched the persecution of 446.
• Emperor Wencheng (r. 452–465): restored Buddhism and sponsored the first caves.
• Empress Dowager Feng (442–490): regent and patron during the middle phase.
• Emperor Xiaowen (r. 471–499): moved the capital to Luoyang in 494.

Legacy

Yungang established a model of imperial Buddhist cave temples that shaped later sites in China, Korea and Japan. Its style evolved directly into that of the Longmen Grottoes near Luoyang, where the Tang dynasty later carved the great Vairocana Buddha of the Fengxian Temple.

The site has suffered from weathering, coal dust from the Datong mining region and the removal of heads and reliefs by collectors in the early 20th century. Since the 1960s and especially after its inscription on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2001, conservation work, traffic diversion and digital recording have tried to protect the soft sandstone.

Timeline

• 386: The Tuoba Xianbei found the Northern Wei.
• 398: Pingcheng (Datong) becomes the capital.
• 439: The Northern Wei unites northern China.
• 446: Emperor Taiwu orders the persecution of Buddhism.
• 452: Emperor Wencheng restores Buddhism.
• c. 460: Tanyao begins Caves 16 to 20.
• c. 471–494: Middle phase of paired caves under Emperor Xiaowen and Empress Dowager Feng.
• 494: The capital moves to Luoyang; imperial patronage shifts to Longmen.
• c. 525: Carving at Yungang largely ends.
• 2001: Inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Why it matters

The Yungang Grottoes are among the earliest and grandest monuments of Chinese Buddhism. They show how a dynasty of steppe origin used Buddhist art to proclaim its legitimacy, and how styles from India and Central Asia were transformed into a Chinese tradition of sculpture.