Preliminary Assessment Report on the Anyuan Temple

The need to conserve one's cultural and architectural heritage, in its authentic and original state, is a rather recent concept throughout Asia, but one which is progressively gaining ground and authoritative standing. This new awareness of the necessity to protect cultural heritage originating from the past is without doubt linked to the worrying disappearance of parts of the ancient East's distinctive environment, due to a deleterious combination of multiple factors, including: destruction as a result of war, environmental degradation and climatic changes, public apathy and property speculation. Architectural and monumental testimony arriving from the past is frequently unable to stand up to the abrupt transition from an agrarian economy to rapid industrial expansion; just such a progression of events has resulted in huge damage and destabilization to the entire landscape-architectural aspect of the Chengde area. These phenomena are particularly evident in the outlying temples, which have had to contend with modern building expansion that is often completely unplanned. Additionally, the heritage suffers exposure to atmospheric pollution and the lack of established policies to ensure effective management of the territory. The inclusion of the 'Mountain Resort and its Outlying Temples of Chengde' on the World Heritage List has represented, without doubt, an attempt to improve the safeguarding and management of the site; the listing has also served to bring the problem to the attention of internationally recognised experts. Recognition of the full potential of the Resort and Outlying Temples is essential in order to be able to realise an adequate safeguarding policy for the entire Chengde site. The Imperial Residence occupies a surface area of 564 hectares, equivalent to a third of city's urban area, and two times greater than the area covered by the Summer Palace in Beijing. The Imperial Residence represents, for its visitors, the largest complex of imperial palaces and gardens in the whole of China. In the light of these data one can readily understand how a serious safeguarding and conservation policy for the monumental complex will result in a greater level of knowledge (and diffusion of the same) of the heritage complex, which is considered one of the greatest undertakings of the Qing Dynasty. Such a strategy would have very considerable economic consequences for the entire city. For this reason, the adoption of a Conservation Master Plan has been deemed the best solution for the management of this particular example of landscape-cultural heritage which is in need of protection. As part of the general framework described above, the preliminary conservation study of the Anyuan Temple (carried out with the assistance of numerous specialists in various disciplines) can be considered - in addition to being an interesting training experience for a group of students an exemplar for a methodology that can, and must, be applied every time one of the extant monuments within the Mountain Resort complex requires a similar assessment. The studies carried out, which are far from exhaustive, have in any event supplied a useful body of data and relevant indications that will certainly provide an appropriate point of departure for a prospective second application phase to be realised in the future.