Mount Emei

Name

Emei in Chinese means "towering eyebrows".

Relevance to Buddhism

Chinese people offer burning sandalwood near the mountain to send their "prayers to heaven".

As a sacred mountain

Mount Emei is one of the Four Sacred Buddhist Mountains of China, and is traditionally regarded as the bodhimaṇḍa, or place of enlightenment, of the Bodhisattva Puxian (普賢菩薩; Samantabhadra).

Sources of the 16th and 17th centuries allude to the practice of martial arts in the monasteries of Mount Emei, which made the earliest extant reference to the Shaolin Monastery as the place of origin of Chinese martial arts.

Chinese Buddhist pilgrims regularly travel to the mountain.

Buddhist architecture on Emei

This is the location of the first Buddhist temple built in China in the 1st century CE. The site has seventy-six Buddhist monasteries of the Ming and Qing dynasties, most of them located near the mountain top. The monasteries demonstrate a flexible architectural style that adapts to the landscape. Some, such as the halls of Baoguosi, are built on terraces of varying levels, while others, including the structures of Leiyinsi, are on raised stilts. Here the fixed plans of Buddhist monasteries of earlier periods were modified or ignored in order to make full use of the natural scenery. The buildings of Qingyinge are laid out in an irregular plot on the narrow piece of land between the Black Dragon River and the White Dragon River. The site is large and the winding footpath is 50 km long, taking several days to walk.{{cite book

Cable cars ease the ascent to the two temples at Jinding (3,077 m), an hour's hike from the mountain's peak.

Climate

The summit of Mount Emei has an alpine subarctic climate (Köppen Dwc), with long, cold (but not severely so) winters, and short, cool summers. The monthly 24-hour average temperature ranges from −5.7 °C in January to 11.6 °C in July, and the annual mean is 3.07 °C. Precipitation is common year-round (occurring on more than 250 days), but due to the influence of the monsoon, rainfall is especially heavy in summer, and more than 70% of the annual total occurs from June to September.

| Jan record high C = 17.7 | Feb record high C = 18.6 | Mar record high C = 23.9 | Apr record high C = 22.7 | May record high C = 24.2 | Jun record high C = 22.5 | Jul record high C = 22.1 | Aug record high C = 21.5 | Sep record high C = 22.2 | Oct record high C = 19.3 | Nov record high C = 19.5 | Dec record high C = 18.9 | year record high C = 22.7 | Jan record low C = −19.2 | Feb record low C = −19.1 | Mar record low C = −17.2 | Apr record low C = −10.6 | May record low C = −7.4 | Jun record low C = −0.2 | Jul record low C = 2.1 | Aug record low C = 2.8 | Sep record low C = −3.5 | Oct record low C = −11.1 | Nov record low C = −14.7 | Dec record low C = −19.7 all-time extreme temperature{{cite web |access-date= 2024-11-05

Indigenous animals

There are nearly 400 total species of animals, invertebrates and plants native to the mountain. There are at least six snake species native to the region, including the Chinese slug snake, Mandarin ratsnake, mountain water snake, Peters' odd-scaled snake, plus some potently venomous species, such as the Chinese green tree viper, the brown spotted pitviper and the Taiwan mountain pitviper.

Visitors to Mount Emei will likely see dozens of Tibetan macaques, which can often be viewed taking food from tourists. A famously well-fed, one-armed, elderly female macaque named Xing Xing has millions of views on YouTube, seemingly showing the macaques’ complete disdain for the hordes of tourists who are often offering them food directly in their faces. It seems that only one elderly woman who lives on the mountain, and her son, are able to be close to Xing Xing, to feed and pet her. Xing Xing appears to consider the woman her best friend, while shunning the offers of food from strangers. If tourists persist in holding food in the monkeys’ faces, they will aggressively grab at the person’s clothing and stare at them, and not let go. If the person continues to irritate the macaque, they are very easily angered and prone to bite. Still, local merchants sell nuts and other foods for the tourists to attempt to feed the monkeys.

Other local animals include lizards, such as the Indian forest skink and the lacerta Takydromus intermedius, the frogs Rana adenopleura and Vibrissaphora liui, and a giant, half-metre long earthworm species, Pheretima praepinguis.

Flora

Mount Emei is known for its high level of endemism, and approximately 200 plant species have been described as endemic to the area. One example is Abies fabri, a rare species of fir tree.

Gallery

File:峨眉山风景区 Mount Emei Scenic Area 06.jpg|Wanfoding File:Mount Emei pic 3.jpg|A temple at the Golden Summit File:Massive golden buddha on the sumit of Eimei Shan.jpg|Massive statue of Samantabhadra at the summit of Mount Emei File:Baoguosi.jpg|Baoguo Temple, a Buddhist temple File:报国寺弥勒殿.JPG|Buddhist temple at Mount Emei File:CrystalStreamOverpass2.jpg|Wooden bridgewalk over the Crystal Stream, western slopes File:MacaqueEmeishan.jpg|Macaque indigenous to the region File:Sunrise at Eimei Shan.jpg|Sunrise over Mount Emei File:Sunrise over clouded sea on sumit of Eimei Shan.jpg|Sunrise over a sea of clouds at Mount Emei File:Guangfu pavilion at Mount Emei.JPG|Guangfu pavilion, with summit visible in background File:Elephant statues in the fog on the steps of the temple atop Mount Emei.jpg|Elephant statues on the steps leading to the statue of Samantabhadra File:Mount emei tour.jpg|alt=mount emei travel guide|Monkeys of Mount Emei File:在峨秀湖远望峨眉山 Mount Emei 1.jpg|Mount Emei and Exiu Lake File:在峨秀湖远望峨眉山 Mount Emei 2.jpg|Mount Emei and Exiu Lake

References

References

1. {{cite opentopomap. Emei. 29.51013. 103.33225. 2023-05-11
2. In the name "Emei", the character ''méi'' 眉 is sometimes written 嵋; the character ''"É"'' 峨 is occasionally written 峩.
3. E.g., 实用中国地图集 (''Shiyong Zhongguo Dituji'', "Practical Atlas of China"), 2008, {{ISBN. 978-7-5031-4772-2; map of Sichuan on pp. 142–143
4. "字頭 「峨」". Chinese University of Hong Kong.
5. (1999). "Spectacular China". Könemann.
6. (1989). "A Day in the Life of China". [[William Collins, Sons.
7. Zhāng Kǒngzhāo 張孔昭. (c. 1784). "Boxing Classic: Essential Boxing Methods 拳經拳法備要 Quánjīng Quánfǎ Bèiyào".
8. Henning, Stanley E.. (Fall 1999). "Academia Encounters the Chinese Martial Arts". China Review International.
9. Hayes, Holly (2009) [http://www.sacred-destinations.com/china/emei-shan Emei Shan], Sacred Destinations. Updated 24 July 2009.
10. Gluckman, Ron (2002). [http://www.gluckman.com/Emei.html Getting to the Top], ''Silk Road'', December 2002. Hong Kong; Dragon Airlines.
11. link. [[China Meteorological Administration]]
12. "Sina Visitor System". 中国气象爱好者 on [[Weibo]].
13. (2023-04-20). "峨眉山城市介绍".
14. "Abies fabri {{!}} Threatened Conifers of the World (en-GB)".