Note: So as not to over-load these image-galleries, I’ve put photos from other shrines at the same village on a separate page, accessed here.
Structure Type: Village Temple 村廟.
Location: Guang’en Tun Village, Zhuolu County, Hebei Province 河北省涿鹿縣廣恩屯村. Very unusually for a temple to the Perfected Warrior, the temple is in fact located outside of the old fort and about 70 meters to the south, where it forms one structure within a larger complex devoted to Lord Guan 關公. The place where one would usually expect a Temple to the Perfected Warrior to sit, on the northern wall of the fort, is now occupied by a small structure that locals simply call a “bell-tower” 鐘樓. This may imply something about the date of the founding of the fort or the temple (either later or earlier than the usual 16th century foundation dates of most settlements around here) but I have no idea what.
Period: I am genuinely unsure of the dates of this mural. 17th century is a shot in the dark; it could be early 20th century for all I know. (This temple presents itself to me as a possible stylistic comparison, unfortunately equally hard to date.) I’m proposing a seventeenth date based mostly on the overall pale and green palette (which suggests Qing), and the delicate patterning of the clouds, specifically the lustrous pinks and whites (which seem Ming-dynasty to me). To make things more complicated, the triangular panels under the rafters appear to be in a different and much cruder hand, implying that the temple was repaired at some point. It’s notable that the same village also contains another temple with murals apparently from 1638, although clearly in a different hand and with a different palette.
Artist: Unknown.
Mural Contents: The murals show the apotheosis of the Perfected Warrior 真武起聖綠, in which he is born into a palace, leaves to meditate on Mount Wudang 武當山, receives a sword from the Jade Emperor 玉皇賜劍, defeats and receives the obeisance of the Turtle and Snake demons 龜蛇, etc. The space of the temple was very narrow, and I took terrible photos; attempts to composite them into a full picture of the wall were only partially successful.
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