Xuankong Temple, located 5 kilometers south of Hunyuan town in Shanxi Province; is perched on the cliff of Mount Hengshan. It is one of the key cultural relics sites under state protection and the only temple in existence featuring the cultures of the three Chinese religions, i. e. Buddhism, Taoism and Confucianism. First built in the late Northern Wei more than 1400 years ago, Xuankong Tem-pIe was taken as the Taoist altar when the Northen Wei Dynasty moved the initial Taoist altar in Pingcheng (now Datong City) southward there. The ancient craftsmen built this temple in accordance with the Taoist requirement of "not hearing the sound of cock crowing and dog barking". lt was later renovated in the Jin, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties. Xuankong Temple, about so meters above the ground,developed the traditions and siyles of architecture in our country. The architectural features of the temple can be summarized in three characters, that is, "Qi" ( surprising) , "Xuan" ( hanging) and "Qiao" ( ingenious). What is " surprising" is "its design and location selection. In a small basin in the deep valley, the temple hangs in the middle of the cliff, the top protruding part of which, like an umbrella ,protects it from the erosion of the rain. Besides, the surrounding mountains reduce the time of sunshine streaming into the temple. The favorable geographical location is one of the important reasons Xuankong Temple can be well preserved. " Hanging" is another feature of the temple, which, with a total of 40 halls, was proppeded up by ten bowl-mouth-thick wooden beams on the surface. In fact, some of them do not bear any load at all. The temple, with its centre of gravity actually in the hard rocks, took as its base the beams partially inserted into the cliff in the light of the principle of mechanics. The "ingenuity" of the temple can be displayed in its corformity with the local conditions in the building process. The craftsmen, taking full advantage of the natural state of the cliff, arranged and built the various parts of the temple, making the layout and design of the plain architectural structure for the ordinary temples ingeniously realized in the three-dimensional space. There are in the temple over 80 Buddha statues. Xuankong Temple has gained for its mystery and ingenuity a reputation in the history of ancient and modern architecture. We could not help expressing our admiration and surprise for its audacity, ingenuity and dauntlessness, not only in the design methods but in the architectural conceptions. Li Bai, after visiting Xuankong Temple in the 23rd year of Kaiyuan of the Tang Dynasty (735) , wrote the two characters "Zhuang Guan" ( meaning magnificent and imposing) on the cliff. The great traveller in the Ming Dynasty, Xu Xiake, once called the temple "a great scenery in the world".