The oldest classical garden in Ming Dynasty--Zhanyuan

Located in the core area of ​​the Qinhuai Scenery Zone in the Confucius Temple in Qinhuai District of Nanjing, Zhanyuan is the oldest classical garden of the Ming Dynasty in Nanjing.

Its history can be traced back to Emperor Wu Prefecture before Zhu Yuanzhang become the Ming dynasty emperor. Later it was bestowed to Zhongshan Emperor Xu Da as his government office. It is known as a rockery and named from Ouyang Xiu's poem “Looking forward to Yutang, seems to be in heaven”. It was called “South Capital First Garden" in the Ming Dynasty.

Zhanyuan is the best-preserved Ming Dynasty classical garden architecture group in Nanjing. Its main color is white walls and grey roof tiles. It is also the only open Ming Dynasty palace. It was part of the Ming Dynasty's founding hero Xu Da government. It served as the work place for the Jiangnan Buzheng officier in the Qing Dynasty. In the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom time, it was the palace of Yang Xiuqing king. Like the majority of gardens in the south of the Yangtze River, the Zhanyuan Temple has undergone complex history and the landscape has undergone changes since the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom time, the Republic of China and the contemporary.

With a total area of ​​approximately 20,000 square meters, Zhanyuan boasts a total of more than twenty scenic spots, elegant and exquisite layout. There are magnificent buildings in the Ming and Qing Dynasties, steep rocky rockery, and the famous Northern Song Dynasty Taihu Stone, quiet and elegant buildings and pavilions. The peaks are strange stacked.