Confucius Cemetery


The Cemetery of Confucius lies to the north of the town of Qufu, the oldest graves found in this location
date back to the Zhou Dynasty.

The original tomb erected here in memory of Confucius on the bank of the Sishui River had the shape of
an axe. In addition, it had a brick platform for sacrifices. The present-day tomb is a cone-shaped hill.

Tombs for the descendants of Confucius and additional stele to commemorate him were soon added
around Confucius' tomb. Since Confucius' descendants were conferred noble titles and were given
imperial princesses as wives, many of the tombs in the cemetery show the status symbols of noblemen.
Tombstones came in use during the Han Dynasty, today, there are about 3,600 tombstones dating from
the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties still standing in the cemetery. In 1331 construction work began on the wall and gate of the cemetery.

In this space, the tombs of more than 100,000 descendants of Confucius, who have been buried there over a period of about 2000 years, can be
found. The oldest graves date back to the Zhou Dynasty, the most recent of which belong to descendants in the 76th and 78th generation. The
corpse of the duke of Qufu in the 76th was removed from its grave and hung naked from a tree in front of the palace during the desecration of the
cemetery in the cultural revolution.

The Cemetery is renowned for its natural botanical areas, largely owing to more than 1,000 mature trees. It is said that after Confucius's death,
disciples planted rare trees from all over China. Some of the trees are so rare that their proper names are yet unknown.

As Kong family cemetery, in the past 2000 years, the burial has been never stopped. It is a good place for
researchers to study the transition of burial custom, development of culture, politics and economy in
different generations. In 1961, it was ranked the cultural relics under the state-level protection. Besides
Confucius Cemetery is also a natural plant garden or arboretum. In this cemetery, it is also a large
museum to show the inscription steles written by many famous calligraphists in the past.