Golden Hair Tower

[Blonde Hair Tower]

Blonde Hair Tower, height 147 cm, base 70 × 70 cm

The tower is composed of six parts: footwall, tower bucket, tower belly, tower neck, tower umbrella, and sun and moon. Each layer is inlaid with jewels, turquoise, coral, etc. at appropriate positions. In the belly of the pagoda, there is a gold box for holding the Buddha’s hair. The front of the gold box is decorated with six words of truth, the wall of the box is decorated with eight auspicious patterns, and the bottom is equipped with a white sandalwood seat. The lower part of the tower is decorated with red sandalwood, lotus petals, and Xumizuo. On the front panel of the tower seat, there is a “Made with Respect in the Qianlong Year of the Qing Dynasty” inscription

In the 42nd year of Qianlong (1777), Empress Dowager Chongqing, Emperor Qianlong’s biological mother, died of illness in the Changchun Immortal Hall in the Yuanmingyuan. Emperor Qianlong, in order to show his filial piety to his deceased mother, issued an imperial edict to make a golden pagoda less than a month after her death, specifically for the Empress Dowager

The Golden Hair Tower shared over 3000 taels of gold, and was commissioned by the Qing Palace Fabrication Office, which dispatched ministers such as Fu Long’an and He Shen to supervise the construction. The design of the Golden Hair Pagoda was determined by Emperor Qianlong, and after more than three months of intense work, it was placed in the East Buddha Hall of the Shoukang Palace, where Empress Dowager Chongqing lived before her death. The golden hair tower is made by the process of plate pattern welding and hammer tire flower carving, with exquisite patterns and exquisite shapes, reflecting the level of metal technology in the Qianlong Dynasty of the Qing Dynasty