One of the most famous temples in Beijing is Tanzhe Temple, which is the oldest temple in the governing areas of Beijing. It has seen 1,700 years of history stretching back to ancient China. So far, numerous monks have lived and passed away in the temple. Therefore, you will be able to view different styles of towers under which monks have been buried after you enter the temple. The specialty of the temple is not these towers but one, it is said, under which a tiger was buried.

This tower is called Tiger Tower (Chinese: 虎塔; pinyin: Hu Ta), which is located on the slope of the northwest path outside Xia Ta Lin Yuan (Chinese: 下塔林院; literal translation: Down Tower Forest Yard). This tower is made of bricks and stone and was built in a Buddhist style, with a height of 7.5 meters. It is said no monks were buried under it but a tiger, which originally resided on Hu Ju Feng (Chinese: 虎踞峰; literal translation: Tiger Lodging Peak) and often walked down the peak to hunt for live stock. Later, a monk Buddhist-named Yinliang Master of the temple taught it Buddhist ideas and made it get rid of its evil spirit, and it finally began eating vegetarian. Each day it lay beside the monk, listening to him preach.

After the monk passed away, the tiger stopped eating and cried everyday. It died five days later. Monks of the temple were touched by the tiger’s sincerity and buried it according to the burial treatment of a great monk by building a Buddhist tower for it, which was given the name Tiger Tower.

Source: chinanews.com