Leshan Giant Buddha，also known as Lingyun Giant Buddha, is called "Jiazhou Lingyun Temple Maitreya Stone Statue". It is located at the side of Lingyun Temple on the east bank of Minjiang River in the south of Leshan City, Sichuan Province, near the confluence of Dadu River, Qingyi River and Minjiang River. The Great Buddha is a seated statue of Maitreya Buddha, standing at a height of 71 meters, and is the largest cliff carved statue in China. The Leshan Giant Buddha was excavated in the first year of Kaiyuan (713) of the Tang Dynasty and completed in the 19th year of Zhenyuan (803), lasting about 90 years.
The head of the Leshan Giant Buddha is 14.7m high, 10m wide, 1051 hair buns, and 7m long ears. It is carved from the mountain and sits close to the river. It is solemn and magnificent. On the cliffs along the river on both sides of the Great Buddha, there are two statues of the Guardian Heavenly Kings, each over 16 meters tall.
On the right side of the Buddha statue, there is a nine curved ancient plank road, which was left behind during the excavation of the Buddha statue in the Tang Dynasty for construction and Buddhist worship. It was excavated along the cliff, winding many times and extremely steep.After the completion of the carving of the Great Buddha, a seven story tower was built to cover it (there is also a saying that there are 9 or 13 floors), which was then called the "Great Buddha Pavilion" and "Great Statue Pavilion". But the Buddha Pavilion has been repeatedly built and destroyed. The Leshan Giant Buddha is the crystallization of the wisdom of the ancient Chinese working people and a miracle in the world cultural history.
On August 16, 1956, the Leshan Giant Buddha was announced by the Sichuan Provincial People's Committee as a cultural relics protection unit in Sichuan Province. On February 23, 1982, the Leshan Giant Buddha Scenic Area was announced by the State Council of the People's Republic of China as the second batch of national key cultural relics protection units.
