Why can't the dragons in the Hall of Supreme Harmony in Beijing be counted?

There is a two-part allegorical saying in the Forbidden City: "The dragons in the Hall of Supreme Harmony-I can't count them." In other words, there are too many dragons on it, many people have counted them, but no one can count them clearly, so there is a two-part allegorical saying "Dragons in the Hall of Supreme Harmony-countless". There is really something to say about this.

Emperor Yongle moved to Beijing for a year, and the Hall of Supreme Harmony in the Forbidden City was destroyed by a fire. At that time, Emperor Yongle was very angry and did not rebuild. It was not until several decades later that the Orthodox Emperor Zhu Qizhen rebuilt it. Who knows that there was another fire in Jiajing period, and the Hall of Supreme Harmony was burned down again.

The emperor said that the geomantic omen in the imperial city was broken and burned by fire, because there was nothing to ward off evil spirits. So I specially invited a Mr. Feng Shui to find a way to avoid the disaster of "skyfire".

The invited Mr. Feng Shui is Tang Yong, a famous "fortuneteller" in Beijing. Emperor Jiajing really regarded him as a master and trusted him very much.

After eating and drinking enough, the Feng Shui master went to visit the site of Fengtian Temple. About an hour later, I went to see Emperor Jiajing and told him that the fire in this palace was caused by the Jade Emperor. He said he was a dragon and you were an earthworm. He wanted to destroy you, so he sent down the sky fire to burn you. "

Emperor Jiajing hurriedly asked him if there was any way to avoid the "skyfire", but Mr. Feng Shui hesitated. Emperor Jiajing knew his intention and said to him, "As long as you can solve this matter, there will be a great reward, otherwise, I will kill you!" " .

Seeing that the emperor had made a promise, Mr. Feng Shui said, "There are 8,900 dragons in the Jade Emperor's Lingxiao Hall. In order to avoid the invasion of the Jade Emperor's Skyfire, when you rebuild this Fengtian Temple, the number of dragons on it will greatly increase, and your' earthworm' will overwhelm his' dragon'. " In this way, the jade emperor's "skyfire" can't help him. "

Seeing that he made it clear, the emperor immediately ordered: "The Fengtian Temple will be rebuilt next spring, with 10,000 dragon sculptures and paintings on it, only more, not less!"

After the completion of the newly-built Fengtian Hall, Emperor Jiajing personally came to inspect it. Liu, who presided over the reconstruction project, followed him and explained the situation of carving dragons and painting dragons to the emperor in detail. He said: "There are13,844 dragons in different shapes, including walking dragons, pandragons and ring dragons, which is 3,844 more than you said."

After hearing this, Emperor Jiajing thought with a big smile: Now I am not afraid of the Jade Emperor's "skyfire"! Suddenly, he became very serious and said to Liu, "This secret must not be revealed. You mustn't tell anyone how many dragons there are outside this temple, lest the jade emperor know and break my law of avoiding' skyfire'. "

After Liu obeyed, Long live the grandfather gave him two thousand two hundred pieces of silver and told her to go home.

But Emperor Jiajing was suspicious by nature. He was afraid that Liu would spill the beans and reveal his "secret", so he sent someone to kill him. As we all know, once when Liu was drunk, he told a dozen people on the wine table how many dragons there were in Fengtian Temple, and things spread like this.

Many people know how many dragons there are in Baohe Hall, but it is too difficult to count them one by one. That's why there is a two-part allegorical saying "Dragon in the Hall of Supreme Harmony (Fengtian Hall)-countless".