The SECRETS of Ancient Chinese Wooden Architecture

this is the sakuni Pagoda at forong Temple in shansi Province China it was built in the year 1056 making it almost a thousand years old what is intriguing is this Pagoda is built entirely out of wood and is now the oldest and tallest multi-story wooden structure in the world so how is this possible especially when there have been several large earthquakes in the region during the time that it has been standing well that comes down to the ingenious Construction techniques of Chinese carpenters and we're going to reveal them to you in this video this is the secrets of ancient Chinese wooden architecture forong Temple's Pagoda stands at 220 ft or 67 M tall that makes it about 30 ft taller than the Leaning Tower of Pisa but it manages to stand up straight the structure is entirely made of wood with a huge Buddha statue in the main hall on the first floor and other smaller statues on each of its five levels although the Pagoda is split into five levels its height is that of a nine-story building the structure was built by Emperor daong in the second year of his Reign Over the kitan Le Leo Dynasty which controlled the north of China with the Song Dynasty to the South the Pagoda has been standing ever since and although it has been renovated over the years the main elements of the structure are all original so how could that be how could this wooden structure that used no nail at all to hold the wood together survive earthquakes where other structures crumbled well maybe that has something to do with the power of the Buddha or just on a practical level the Pagoda uses some ingenious Carpenter techniques which also are said to be passed down to humans by the gods well you know sort of cuz you see China has gods of everything right luu is the god of tea then there's shanong the Divine farmer then there's T Jin the kitchen God he's a wacky one and then we have Lan the god of carpentry now these gods for different things were like people on Earth they weren't gods in the heavens but they were believed to be you know Messengers from the Divine that transmitted certain techniques to humans okay so Luan is thought to have lived between 507 and 444 BC during the Spring and Autumn period or chuno janga and at that time he created many inventions that advanced the field of carpentry and wooden architecture for example he invented many of the tools that Carpenters use like the saw the square the drill and his wife apparently invented the umbrella so that he could work in the rain but in addition to that Lou ban invented systems of interlocking wooden beams that allowed construction without nails one of these systems of beams is called Doo and it is an ingenious system where a wooden bracket called a d is AIX to the top of a column and then beams called gong fit into the grooves to support the the roof or the next floor there can be several layers of gong and you can see this system supporting each floor of the saumini Pagoda at forong Temple both outside and inside the building the wood fits together perfectly like we said without the use of nails and relies on friction and the weight of the building above to hold it all together this means there is some elasticity or give in the structure as well as dispersed distribution of weight so buildings that use this system can withstand earthquakes where other more rigid structures May Fail also in shansi Province very close to forong Temple there are some other even older examples of doong on wooden buildings that have survived to this day this is doong supporting the roof of the main East Hall of for Guang temple in the neighboring County of the same Province it was built in the year 857 ad so you are literally looking at wood that is 1,167 years old old still holding up the roof although perhaps still not as impressive as the Pagoda which is nine stories in height and is still Standing Tall through earthquakes even after almost A Thousand Years the Pagoda was placed on China's tentative list for UNESCO world heritage sites in 2013 and now it's 11 years later and nothing seems to have happened those UNESCO people are slow but hey the building's been standing for a thousand years so take your time it's not like it's going to fall down or lean over anytime soon and perhaps the fact that it has been standing so long is a testament to what the building represents Chinese people's reverence for the Buddha they used the most advanced earthquake proof construction methods invented by China's God of carpentry to create a building that has represented their faith for a millennium and perhaps will still be standing for another Millennium to come guys thanks for watching that was the secret of China's traditional wooden architecture I hope you like tip we haven't covered architecture on this channel before so if you want to see more do leave us a comment maybe we could do like China's five most ancient buildings or something like that if you're interested in other aspects of Chinese 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