With a history of more than 2,500 years, the ancient city
of Suzhou, boasting splendid scenery, rich cultural heritage
and abundant agricultural products, is situated in the Lower
Yangtze basin by the side of lake tai. Ever since the founding
of Suzhou as the capital of the Wu Kingdom in 514 B.C., it
has been the political, economic and cultural center of the
region.As a place famed for its well-known scholars, successful
merchants, great architects and distinguished artists, Suzhou
provides favorable conditions for the creation and development
of classical gardens.
The earliest gardens of Suzhou, which belonged to the King
of Wu, can be traced far back to the Spring and Autumn period
in the 6th century B.C. The Pijiang Garden was recorded as
the earliest private garden-house dating from the 4th century
Eastern Jin Dynasties. More gardens were built in the centuries
that followed. During the prosperous Ming and Qing Dynasties,
from the 16th to the 18th centuries that followed. During
the prosperous Ming and Qing Dynasties, from the 16th to the
18th century in particular. Suzhou saw a booming economy .
Consequently, the number of gardens in the city of Suzhou
and its environs increased a great deal, mounting to 200 odd.
Dozens of them have survived to the present and are kept in
a good state of preservation.With their numerical superiority
and artistic perfection, the classical gardens of Suzhou has
had a good reputation in this part of China, popularly known
as "the earthly paradise".
 Laid out within
a limited area by the house, a classical garden of Suzhou
is a microcosm of the world made of the basic elements of
water, stones, plants and different kinds of buildings with
literary allusions. Like a freehand brushwork in traditional
Chinese painting, it is the creation of "urban scenery"
or an amicable environment that brings man into harmony with
nature.Built in a period when privately-owned gardens were
most flourishing, the Humble Administrator's Garden, the Lingering
Garden, the Master-of-Nets Garden and the Mountain Villa with
Embracing Beauty, noted for their beautiful scenes,elegant
buildings and literary connotations, represent the concentrated
essence of wisdom of the Chinese and the finest specimens
of all classical gardens of Suzhou. Like shining pearls, they
are a brilliant part of Chinese cultural heritage. Their characteristics
are as follows:
Firstly,they set fine examples of how garden spaces are
ingeniously handled.
 Interwoven with Taoist
metaphysics of Laozi and Zhangzi,the classical gardens of
Suzhou were laid out in imitation of natural scenery to meet
the intellectual and emotional needs of the Chinese. The terrestrial
contours of the site is always made good use of. Methods and
techniques are numerous, including borrowed views, barred
views, opposite views, framed views, the decorative and functional
alteration, and the abstract and concrete alteration. The
stress is put on meandering through a labyrinth of complexity
and continuous surprises. Within limits the garden spaces
are so ingeniously handled that the effect of infinitude is
produced. In the Humble Administrator's Garden, the Lingering
Garden, the Master-of-Nets Garden and the Mountain Villa with
Embracing Beauty, there are many instances in illustration
of traditional Chinese aesthetics.
Secondly, they are the re-creation of the splendors of natural
scenery through the processes of the decoration of land by
planting trees, shrubs and flowers, and designing and materializing
mountains and watercourses.
 The
classical gardens of Suzhou were designed and built by great
masters of different dynasties, emplying extraordinary methods
and techniques. AS a result, they are unnaturally natural.
Noted for their wonderful landscapes and waterscapes, the
Humble Administrator's garden, the Lingering Garden, the Master-of-Nets
Garden and the Mountain Villa with Embracing Beauty are the
vivid re presentation of natural scenery easy to be found
locally. The miniature mountains made of yellowstones in the
Master-of-Nets Garden or from earth with stones sticking out
of them in the Humble Administrator's Garden and the Lingering
Garden look so natural and spontaneous that they seem to be
rendered without human aid. A number of fine limestones hauled
from Lake Tai to the Lingering Garden, some of which are believed
to be left behind by the imperial collector from the Song
court,have the qualities of being slender, wrinkled, pierced
with holes, yet capable of draining by themselves. The best
lime stone mountain designed and piled up by the great master
Gu Yuliang in the Qing Dynasty is to be found in the Mountain
Villa with Embracing Beauty. Great attention is paid to sequential
loveliness. An abundant variety of flowers and trees are grown
in the gardens.Valued highly for their several hundred years
of age are the ginkoes in the Lingering garden,the wistaria
in the Humble Administrator's Garden and the Sabina chinensis
in the Master-of-Nets garden.
Thirdly, they are an epitome of exquisite and multifarious
buildings of old times in the south of the Lower Yangtze .
 The classical gardens
of Suzhou have many varieties of little pavilions and large
constructions with their basic beam-framing systems such as
Ting,Tang,Xuan,Guan,Lou,Ge,Xie,Fang,Ting(rising tone), and
lang, to satisfy the needs of reading,writing,painting,resting,viewing,meditating,playing
chess,performing on a musical instrument,sipping tea,holding
banquets and so forth. With traditional Chinese furnishings,these
buildings richly ornamented with exquisitely carved door frames,windows,hangings,balustrades
and screens inside and many kinds of lattic--windows,pavements
and moon gates outside,have harmonized impeccably with functional,structural
and aesthetical considerations.
Fourthly, they are rich in literary connotations ,carrying
a tremendous amound of information about Chinese culture.
Intertwined with ancient chinese philosophy, ideology and
aesthetics, the classical gardens of Suzhou are noteworthy
places with unique architectural forms carrying poetic names
in plateaux and parallel couplets in excellent calligraphy
with literary allusion which help to enhance the beauty of
the whole property. Also, there are numerous inscribed stelae
of great antiquity celebrated for their delicate workmanship
and literary connotations. Indeed the classical gardens of
Suzhou are the invaluable reservoir from which we can draw
cultural substances.
To sum up, the classical gardens of Suzhou in the course
of over two millennia have experienced many ups and downs,
and gradually reached a state of artistic perfection. The
sublimities of the classical gardens of Suzhou will endure
forever and ever.
E-mail: szgarden@public1.sz.js.cn
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