A Buddhist stone carving dating back more than 1,000 years was discovered near the World Heritage listed carvings in Dazu county of southwestern China's Chongqing Municipality.

The carving of Guanyin (Buddhist Goddess of Mercy) with a thousand arms was believed to be the oldest of its kind among the ancient stone carvings at Dazu county since it was engraved between 907 to 965 AD, according to local cultural relics experts on Tuesday.

The new carving was found during a survey of the county's stonecarvings in preparation for the UNESCO's coming inspection of the United Nations Education, said Guo Xingjian, curator of the Dazu Stone Carvings Museum.

Though the goddess was carved much earlier than other previously found carvings, Guo said, the craftsmanship employed were much more advanced.

Except for fading and some loss of coloring, the entire grotto was basically well preserved and remained intact, he acknowledged.

The thousand-arm Guanyin is hemmed in by eight carvings of Bodhisattva and others of maids, the god of heaven, mighty warriors and other Buddhist religious figures.

Cultural relics protection experts will meticulously and thoroughly examine the Guanyin carving before framing a protectionprogram.

More than 50,000 individual stone carvings were dotted and scattered in grottoes at Dazu, 60 kilometers southeast of Chongqing municipality.

Work on the Dazu stone carvings, which began in the early Tang Dynasty (618-907), lasted approximately 1,000 years to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911).

The carvings were listed among items of major World Heritage sites by the UNESCO in December 1999.

(Xinhua News Agency July 22, 2003)