A cliff built in clay and pigment

Mogao occupies the east face of Mingsha Mountain, about 25 kilometres southeast of Dunhuang. The Dunhuang Academy describes a cliff roughly two kilometres long and forty to fifty metres high, made of conglomerate: pebbles and sand cemented together. Such stone is too loose for fine carving, so builders shaped clay figures and plastered the walls before painting them. The southern part of the cliff holds most decorated caves; the northern stretch includes smaller rooms, some used as living or working spaces. Timber eaves still mark a few cave fronts. Seen from the path, the cliff is less a single monument than a long street of rooms cut into a fragile slope.

A stele dated 698 records the account that places the first cave in 366, when the monk Lezun began work under the Former Qin. The Academy also notes earlier written traditions dated to 353 and the late Western Jin, so 366 is a recorded tradition rather than the only surviving date. Work continued through successive dynasties into the Yuan. UNESCO counts 492 preserved caves, about 45,000 square metres of murals and more than 2,000 painted sculptures; the Dunhuang Academy’s own inventory describes additional figures and cave details. Hall caves and central-pillar caves organize worship differently: one draws the eye toward an altar-like rear wall, while the other lets worshippers circle a central structure. Mogao entered the World Heritage List in 1987.

Cave 17 opens from the north wall of Cave 16’s passage. The Academy identifies it as the memorial chamber of the monk Hongbian, made in the late Tang, and describes a small room with a platform, a seated figure and painted trees. Early in the eleventh century, workers sealed its doorway and painted over the entrance. Wang Yuanlu discovered it in 1900 while clearing sand. The chamber held tens of thousands of manuscripts and objects in Chinese and other languages, spanning several centuries. That collection connected the cave to administration, religion, travel and everyday writing across Inner Asia. The room had first served as a memorial chapel; its later use as a repository left a rare paper archive inside the painted cliff.