Some forty kilometers to the west of Luoyang is a town called Tiemen("Iron Gate)7in Xin'an County.It is Ranked by a winding Phoenix Hill on the north and a magnificent Green Dragon Hill on the south.Between the “dragon” and “phoenix” flows a clear stream of water through a mountain gorge.The region,apart from its idyllic setting,is rich in minerals and farm products.
But the greatest attraction for tourists at Tiemen is the so-called Zhelu(“secluded Dwelling)”,once the prlvate garden of a general of the National Revolutionary Army.Zhang Fang,who was also assistant curator of the Museum of Chinese History in Beijing-Mr.Zhang was very fond of painting,calligraphy,and stone and metal inscriptions.During his lifetime he recovered many lost or abandoned stone inscriptions in the Luoyang region.He sent them to his hometown Tiemen.where he had them inlaid in the walls of a studio on the west side of his private garden.He named the place the Studio of a Thousand Tang Tablets.for which ZhangTaiyan-a sinologst of modern China, wrote a plaque.
This studio is the most important as well as most fascinating part of Zhelu.lt is made up of three courtyards,a corridor,and fifteen arched brick caves in which are stored over 1400 inscribed tablets.As most of them date back to the Tang dynasty, the repository is called the Studio of a Thousand Tang Tablets. Actually,you will find here reproductions on stone of famous calligraphies of many other periods: vertical scrolls in runningcursive hand by Wang Hong of the Southern Dynasties,a couplet in running-cursive hand by Mi Fei of the Song,an inscription in regular characters by Zhao Mengfu of the Yuan,a horizontal scroll by Dong qichang of the Ming,and the handwritings of Wang Duo the “Magic Brush”, Liu Yong, Shao Ying,Han Dongli,and Zheng Banqiao of the Qing.
Zheng Banqiao was a xiucai of Emperor kangxi's reign and a juren of Yongzheng's reign.One of the so-called eight eccentrics of Yangzhou,his forte was the painting of orchids and bamboo.Reproductions of four of his poetry-paintings are preserved in this studio.These paintings depict not only the four seasons but four kinds of weather:clear,overcast,rain,snow. The ingenious conception reflects the artist's skill and his intimate knowledge of the bamboo.
Most of the tomb inscriptions preserved in the studio belong to different periods of Tang history and to different social classes.Therefore,some people call them a history of the Tang dynasty on stone.These inscriptions also give us glimpses ofthe evolution of Chinese calligraphy.

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