Jùyě

Juye's old county town in southwestern Shandong contained a Buddhist landmark whose history was shaped by repeated flooding. Yongfeng Pagoda stood within the former Great Buddha Temple and was also known as the Buddhist Pagoda. Its origins were associated with construction before and during the Northern Song. The tower's octagonal brick stages, doorways and internal stairways made it a substantial monument in a lowland town exposed to river-borne sediment.

Late-fourteenth-century floods buried its lower stages, leaving five visible above ground. The monument was repeatedly repaired, including during the Qianlong and Jiaqing reigns of the Qing. Its later name, Yongfeng, expressed a wish for abundant harvests year after year. This combination of Buddhist patronage, flood damage and repair belonged to Juye's own urban landscape. The tower's survival through the Ming and Qing connected the county town with its older religious foundations, even as sediment changed the level of the ground around it.