Confucius Temple & Imperial College

Lonely Planet review

Long neglected like a piece of unloved bric-a-brac, the arid Confucius Temple offers a quiet sanctuary from Běijīng's smoggy streets and snarling traffic. West of the Confucius Temple stands the Imperial College (Guózǐjiān), where the emperor expounded the Confucian classics to an audience of thousands - an annual rite. Some of Běijīng's last remaining páilou (decorative archways) bravely survive in the hútòng outside (Guozijian Jie).

Built by the grandson of Kublai Khan in 1306, the former college was the supreme academy during the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties. On the site is a marvellous glazed, three-gate, single-eaved decorative archway, called a liúli páifāng (glazed archway). The Biyong Hall beyond is a twin-roofed structure with yellow tiles surrounded by a moat and topped with a gold knob.

In a bid to clear the dust that swathes its cypresses and pavilions, China's second largest Confucian temple has restored its main hall, which houses a statue of the sage, Kongzi (Confucius).

Like everywhere in town, skeletons lurk in the temple cupboard and a distasteful footnote lurks unrecorded behind the tourist blurb. Běijīng writer Lao She was dragged here in August 1966, forced to his knees in front of a bonfire of Beijing opera costumes to confess his anti-revolutionary crimes, and beaten. The much-loved writer drowned himself the next day in Taiping Lake.