Discover Chengdu
Wuhou Shrine Museum
武侯祠博物馆
A walled garden complex honouring Zhuge Liang, the strategist of the Three Kingdoms period, alongside the tomb of the Shu emperor Liu Bei. If you know the Three Kingdoms stories - or want to - this is where Chinese visitors come to pay respects, under some beautiful old cypresses and red walls.
The story
What makes this place special
The site began in 223 CE as Huiling, the tomb of Liu Bei, founder of the Shu Han state, and the temple to him is properly called the Han Zhaolie Temple. A separate shrine to his chancellor Zhuge Liang - the Marquis Wu, hence Wuhou - stood alongside it from before the Tang. In the early Ming the prince of Shu, Zhu Chun, argued that ruler and minister should be housed together and had Zhuge Liang's image moved into Liu Bei's temple, producing the arrangement that survives: the only temple in China where a sovereign and his minister are worshipped jointly. Ordinary people have always called the whole complex Wuhou Shrine rather than Zhaolie Temple, because Zhuge Liang mattered more to them than the emperor did.
What you’ll discover
Through the gate marked Han Zhaolie Temple you pass the Tang stele known as the Three Perfections, praised for its text, calligraphy and carving alike, then the Liu Bei hall, then the flanking corridors holding twenty-eight statues of Shu Han officials - civil ministers in the east gallery, generals in the west. Behind and lower down is the Zhuge Liang hall, with three bronze drums in front said to date from his southern campaigns, and beyond that the Sanyi Temple to the oath of Liu Bei, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei, moved here in 1997-98 from its original Kangxi-era site. At the back is Huiling, Liu Bei's burial mound, approached by the red-walled bamboo corridor that is now the most photographed spot in the complex.
A little local insight
Good to know before you go
- The red wall corridor on the approach to Huiling - tall bamboo leaning in over a crimson wall - is the one image everyone wants, and by mid-morning there is a photo queue. Go first thing and it is yours.
- Read the Three Perfections stele before the halls. It is the oldest object on the site by several hundred years and nearly everyone walks past it to get to the statues.
- The galleries of twenty-eight statues are the part to slow down for if you know the Three Kingdoms at all - they are a who's who of the novel, and the Chinese visitors standing in front of them are recognising characters, not reading history.
- Jinli is right next door and shares a wall, so plan them as one visit, with the shrine in the morning and Jinli for lunch or the evening.
- Around Chinese New Year the shrine hosts the Chengdu Temple Fair with lanterns and ritual re-enactments - transformative if you are here then, and impossible to get round if you only wanted the temple.
When to come
Early morning for the red-wall corridor and the halls before the coach parties. Autumn and spring are most pleasant; the complex is heavily shaded, which makes it one of the better options in Chengdu's humid summer.
Getting around
Reasonably good. The complex is flat, laid out on a single level across courtyards and garden paths, with broad paved surfaces, and the distances are modest. The obstacles are the raised stone thresholds and a few steps up into each hall, and the red-wall corridor and bamboo garden paths are paved but uneven in places. A wheelchair user can cover most of the site and reach Huiling, needing help at hall doorways; a bad knee is a non-issue here.
Worth knowing before you go
The red-wall bamboo corridor near the Sanyi Temple side is the photo everyone queues for - go in the first hour after opening to get it empty. Jinli street exits directly from the shrine's east side, so do them together.
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