ZHENGZHOU, July 12 (Xinhua) -- Circling an ancient pagoda, sweeping fallen leaves, and making his rounds at a local cultural relics depot -- this quiet ritual has defined the past eight years for Zhao Zhonghe, a rural cultural relics custodian now in his 70s.
Yet his family's story of guarding the Xiuding Temple Pagoda, a relic of the Northern and Southern dynasties (420-589 A.D.) in Qingliangshan Village, Anyang City in central China's Henan Province, goes back far more than eight years.
"My great-great-grandfather was the first generation of our family to guard this pagoda, and I am now the fifth," said Zhao, speaking with palpable pride as he recounted his family's enduring bond with the ancient structure.
The single-story, square-shaped brick pagoda, inlaid with 3,775 molded tiles and adorned with exquisite relief carvings spanning 300 square meters, holds significant value for the study of China's ancient architectural history, art, ethnicity and religion.
For Zhao, a son of the village, the pagoda was more than a landmark -- it was a quiet companion throughout his childhood, standing just 150 meters from his home.
"When I was a child, my grandfather would take me to inspect the pagoda every two or three days. On those walks, he would tell me stories about how his grandfather protected the ancient pagoda," he recalled.
In the turbulent early 1900s, with the nation in distress, precious cultural relics scattered in the countryside drew keen interest from antique dealers, and the pagoda did not escape their attention.
"According to family elders, a single tile from the pagoda could be traded for 20 pistols at that time. So it drew no shortage of greedy eyes," Zhao said.
To fend off would-be plunderers, Zhao's great-great-grandfather settled on a nearby hilltop overlooking the pagoda. He maintained an unremitting watch and would sound an alarm gong whenever a stranger approached.
He later devised a strategy: coating the pagoda with white plaster to conceal the exquisite patterns on its bricks.
In 1973, Wang Shikuo, a professor at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, accidentally discovered exquisite brick carvings when the white plaster peeled off the pagoda. He then reported the discovery to the relevant authorities, leading to the restoration of the pagoda, which was completed in the early 1980s.
Following his retirement in 2018, Zhao returned to the village and became a custodian of cultural relics, carrying on the family legacy of protecting the pagoda.
In recent years, the pagoda has drawn a growing number of visitors amid rising public interest in cultural heritage, a trend further boosted after the Chinese hit game "Black Myth: Wukong" selected it as a filming location for in-game scene development.
To bring the pagoda's history to life for visitors, Zhao has dedicated nearly all his free time to historical research, consulting experts while gathering oral accounts from village elders and the inscriptions in the village. He has since become a "gold medal guide," offering vivid introductions to every aspect of the ancient structure, from its architectural style and carved patterns to its restoration history.
Over 70,000 tourists from home and abroad have visited the pagoda in the first half of 2026, according to local authorities.
"What impressed me most was a tourist who made a special trip from Toronto, Canada, just to see the pagoda," Zhao said. "She told me she had seen several of its tiles in a Canadian museum, but was still deeply moved when beholding the relic in person."
The local authorities are intensifying their efforts to better conserve the ancient relic while promoting digital information collection. "We have been preserving high-precision digital copies of each tile and each pattern, which not only enables the thousand-year-old pagoda to achieve 'digital immortality,' but facilitates the research and utilization in the future," said Jiao Huimin, director of the cultural relics protection center of Yindu District, Anyang City in the province. Enditem
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