Since ancient times, Jingting Mountain has been favored by literati and scholars who have left numerous poems about it. Hailed as the "Poetic Mountain in Jiangnan Region" both at home and abroad, Jingting Mountain is renowned for the poetry associated with it and become even more famous for those poems.

Jingting Mountain in Xuancheng City (Photo/ Zhang Niandong)

In 495 AD, Xie Tiao was appointed as prefecture chief of Xuancheng. With a great fondness for Jingting Mountain, he wrote numerous poems depicting it. His famous lines like "The sky at sunset like a coloured brocade; The river calm like a skein of white silk" painted a vivid ink landscape with profound artistic conception, thereby initiating a new style in landscape poetry.

Li Bai, the poetic genius born in the Tang Dynasty, expressed admiration for Xie Tiao. He visited Xuancheng seven times and created as many as 45 poems regarding Jingting Mountain. “All birds have flown away, so high; A lonely cloud drifts on, so free. Gazing on Mount Jingting, nor I am tired of him, nor he of me.” Sitting Alone In Face of Peak Jingting written by this great poet has become a timeless masterpiece.

The unique insights and classic poems created by Xie Tiao and Li Bai have made Jingting Mountain renowned. Countless poets followed the footsteps of these two great figures to visit Jingting Mountain. From the Tang Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty, over 320 poets and high-ranking officials successively visited Jingting Mountain and thousands of poems, proses, records, paintings about Jingting Mountain were created throughout history according to preliminary statistics.

(Cao Guangxin)