Mía Pagoda

Mía Pagoda (temple name: Sùng Nghiêm tự, 崇嚴寺) is a pagoda located in Sơn Tây ward, Hanoi city. In the past, this area was called Cam Giá, and its vernacular name was Mía, so this pagoda has become commonly known as Mía Pagoda. This is the pagoda that preserves the largest number of artistic statues in Vietnam (287 statues).

Initially, the pagoda was small in scale, built a long time ago. In 1632, a concubine in Lord Trịnh Tráng's palace, Ngô Thị Ngọc Diệu (also known as Nguyễn Thị Ngọc Dong), saw that the miếu (ancestral shrine) was abandoned and dilapidated, so together with her parents and the people of the villages belonging to Cam Giá district (i.e. Tổng Mía), she restored it. Concubine Ngọc Dong was originally from Nam Nguyễn (Nam An) village in Tổng Mía, so she was affectionately called 'Bà Chúa Mía' (Lady of Mía), and her statue was sculpted and placed for worship in the pagoda, and there is also a separate temple dedicated to her. Later, the pagoda was renovated many times, but to this day, the scale of the restoration from the time of Lady of Mía seems to have been preserved intact.

The bell tower of the pagoda is a three-bay building constructed in the two-storey, eight-roof chồng diêm style (overlapping roofs). All the corners of the roof are adorned with ornamental dragons. The floor is made of wood, and the upper storey has a balustrade with turned balusters. The long beams and side beams are all planed and carved with floral motifs. In the tower hangs a bell cast in the 4th year of Cảnh Hưng (1743) and a bronze gong cast in the 6th year of Thiệu Trị (1864).

Near the bell tower and the ancient banyan tree is the Cửu phẩm Liên Hoa stupa, 13 metres high, which enshrines a relic of the Buddha.

In the front hall, in the right bay, there is a stele carved in 1634, describing the restoration of the pagoda in 1632. The stele is beautifully decorated, over 1.6 metres high and 1.2 metres wide, set on the back of a turtle. The left bay of the front hall has an altar to Princess Liễu Hạnh. Behind the front hall is the Trung Pagoda, followed by the Thượng Pagoda and the hậu đường (rear hall). There are two corridors connecting Trung Pagoda and Thượng Pagoda, surrounding the main Buddha hall in the centre.

Trung Pagoda and Thượng Pagoda still retain their wooden frameworks, with many carved parts dating from the 17th century. Mía Pagoda is quite famous for its number of statues: there are up to 287 large and small statues, including 6 bronze statues, 106 wooden statues, and 174 statues made of lacquered and gilded clay. In Trung Pagoda, there are two large Dharma Protector statues and eight Kim Cương (Vajra) statues. Each statue depicts a martial general in a stance ready to fight to dispel evil and protect the Dharma. The forms and composition are solid, the bodies are well-proportioned, and the lines are relaxed and strong. In Thượng Pagoda, one can also see caves made of moulded earth. Inside and around the caves are quite a few statues. In one cave, there is even a statue of Shakyamuni Buddha entering Nirvana. The Tuyết Sơn statue is 0.76 metres high, and the Quan Âm Tống Tử statue is also 0.76 metres high and very beautiful. The Quan Âm statue is often called the Bà Thị Kính statue. This statue depicts a gentle, charming woman, with a slightly sad but very kind and benevolent face, holding a plump, healthy baby. The carved lines are soft and refined.

The people of Mía village have a folk verse about the statue:

Famed is our village's Mía Pagoda,

With the Tống Tử Bodhisattva Quan Âm statue

With its unique sculptural and architectural artworks, and its grand and beautiful scale, Mía Pagoda has been classified by the Ministry of Culture and Information as an architectural and artistic heritage site.