西安钟楼的导游词

　　The bell tower is located at the intersection of the East, West, South andNorth streets in Xi'an. It was used to ring the bell in the early morning inancient times, so it is called the bell tower. Since its completion, the belltower has been regarded as a symbol of the ancient city of Xi'an and is now akey cultural relic protection unit in Shaanxi Province. It is the largest andbest preserved bell tower left over from ancient China. Xi'an is an importantmilitary and political town in Northwest China in Ming Dynasty. Its bell towerranks the first in terms of architectural scale, historical value and artisticvalue in China.

　　The bell tower was built in 1384. The base of the clock tower is square,covering an area of 1377.4 square meters, 8.6 meters high and 35.5 meters wide,all of which are built with green bricks. The building is of brick and woodstructure, 36 meters high. The external eaves have three layers, but theinternal eaves have only two layers. The eaves of the building have fourcorners, and the eaves are decorated with painted brackets. "Dou Gong" is one ofthe characteristics of ancient wooden buildings in China. It is also unique inthe history of world architecture. It can not only make the building stronger,but also more beautiful. Dougong appeared in Shang Dynasty. We can see acomplete picture of Dougong on the patterns of Chinese bronzes.

　　Features: the bell tower was built in 1384 A.D. in the 17th year of Hongwureign of Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang of Ming Dynasty. It was named after the iron bellhanging on the tower. When it was first built, it was located at today's Guangjistreet, facing the drum tower. In the 10th year of Wanli reign of emperorShenzong of the Ming Dynasty (1582 AD), Gong Xian, the imperial envoy of xun'an,presided over the relocation of the bell tower. The bell tower is a typicalarchitectural style of the Ming Dynasty, with double eaves and Dougong,high-rise and slightly upturned eaves.

　　Anecdote of giant Bell: on the northwest corner of the bell tower is a MingDynasty iron bell, weighing 5 tons, with eight trigrams patterns cast on theside of the bell. It was built in the Chenghua period of the Ming Dynasty(1465-1487). But it is much smaller than the bronze bell that hung in the belltower earlier. The huge bell originally hung in the bell tower is the "Jingyunbell" cast in the Jingyun period of the Tang Dynasty (now stored in the forestof Steles Museum). It is said that after moving to the present site, althoughthe style and size of the building have not changed, the Jingyun bell will neverring. No choice but to change.