Jiuxiao Wanfu Palace (Top Palace, Maoshan)九霄万福宫
- Type
- Temples and Abbeys (Gongguan)
- Location
- China · Jiangsu · Jurong, Zhenjiang · Atop Damao Peak, Mount Mao
- Coordinates
- 31.786, 119.33 Map ↗
- School
- Zhengyi (Orthodox Unity) Daoism, Shangqing (Highest Clarity) School
- First built
- Western Han (tradition: shrine to the Three Mao Perfected Lords) · Built by imperial order during the Yanyou era of the Yuan; granted its present name by imperial decree in the twenty-sixth year of the Wanli era of the Ming (1598); destroyed during the War of Resistance against Japan; rebuilt in the 1980s
- Heritage status
- Jiangsu Provincial Cultural Heritage Site
Overview
The Jiuxiao Wanfu Palace, popularly known as the Top Palace, stands atop Damao Peak, the highest peak of Mount Mao, and is the seat of the Maoshan Daoist Academy and the center of Daoist activity on the mountain. Tradition holds that a shrine to the Three Mao Perfected Lords already stood here in the Han dynasty; in the third year of the Yanyou era of the Yuan (1316), the Shengyou Temple was built by imperial order, and in the twenty-sixth year of the Wanli era of the Ming (1598) it was granted by imperial decree the name 'Jiuxiao Wanfu Palace.' The palace suffered repeatedly from warfare; in 1938 the New Fourth Army used Mount Mao as a base of resistance against Japan, and the temple buildings were mostly destroyed by Japanese forces, before being rebuilt by Jurong City and the Daoist community after the 1980s. The palace today has a Hall of Divine Officer Wang Lingguan, a Scripture Library, the Taiyuan Precious Hall, the Hall of the Two Sages, the Ascension Platform and other structures; the Taiyuan Precious Hall enshrines the Three Mao Perfected Lords. The palace preserves fragmentary Ming and Qing steles as well as inscriptions carved after reconstruction. Every year during the first-month incense-offering season, pilgrims number in the hundreds of thousands; the 'Maoshan incense-offering season' is Jiangsu Provincial Intangible Cultural Heritage.
Highlights
- The Three Mao Perfected Lords in the Taiyuan Precious Hall
- Ascension Platform
- The Maoshan incense-offering season