Baisha

The story

Ten kilometres north of Lijiang's old town, on the open plain under the snow mountain, Baisha was the centre of the Naxi before the old town grew. The Mu chiefs ruled from here before they built their palace in Dayan, and here they built their temples.

From the late fourteenth to the early seventeenth century the Mu called painters from many peoples to decorate the temples. Han painters from the interior, Tibetan painters from the north, Naxi and Bai painters from the region worked on the same walls. Fifty-five murals survive in four buildings. In China they are counted with the paintings of Dunhuang, the Fahai Temple in Beijing and the Yongle Palace in Shanxi as treasures of wall painting.

Part of Old Town of Lijiang. Also there: Black Dragon Pool, Mu Mansion, Shuhe.

What is here

The village is free. The murals site, with the Dabaoji Palace, the Liuli Hall and the Wenchang Palace, has its own ticket.

If you have one minute

In the courtyard of the Dabaoji Palace

The hall in front of you was built in 1582. Inside, a single wall shows the Buddha and his followers in the Han (206 BC–AD 220) style, a Tibetan protector in flames, and Daoist immortals, all painted for the same patron. Look for the faces: some are Han, some Tibetan, some Naxi.

Much was damaged in the twentieth century; parts were scraped or cut away. What survives is protected now and partly shown in digital copies, so that you can see details close up without harming the walls.

Things people often get wrong

"Baisha is a copy of the old town." It is older, quieter and more of a working village, with fields up to its houses.

"The murals are Tibetan." They are a mix, which is their whole interest.

People who stood here

We searched Chinese sources first for this list, then English ones.

• Mu Zeng (Naxi ruler and poet, 1587–1646)Under the Mu chiefs, Mu Zeng among them, painters were brought here from far away to work in the temples.
• Joseph Rock (botanist and explorer, 1884–1962)From 1922 he lived in Yuhu, a village a few kilometres north of Baisha, and from there explored the mountains and studied Naxi ritual books. His house is now a small museum.
• He Shixiu (Naxi herbal doctor, 1923–2013)His herbal clinic in Baisha became famous after foreign writers came to see him, and he welcomed travellers for decades.

Go deeper: five stops in one village

Walk the main street from south to north, visit the murals, then walk out into the fields. Half a day.

1. The main street

The street runs down a gentle slope towards the plain. Houses of earth brick and wood line it, many with a courtyard where maize is hung to dry.

2. The Dabaoji Palace and the Liuli Hall

Two temple halls side by side hold most of the murals. The Liuli Hall, the Glazed Hall, is the older. Inside, it is dim: let your eyes get used to it.

3. The Wenchang Palace

A temple to the god of literature and examinations, begun in the early Ming (1368–1644). Its Qing murals show the imperial examinations, a sign of how the Mu encouraged Chinese learning. It reopened in 2026 with digital displays.

4. Embroidery and the Naxi house

Baisha is known for Naxi embroidery; you can watch women working in the courtyards. Look at a house: walls of earth bricks on a stone base, a roof of grey tiles with a curve at the ends.

5. The fields and the snow mountain

Walk out of the village to the north. The fields open, and Jade Dragon Snow Mountain fills the sky. A few kilometres on is Yuhu village and Joseph Rock's house; nearby, the Jade Water Village keeps a Naxi sacred spring.

The village and the same years elsewhere

The Dabaoji Palace was built in 1582, the year Pope Gregory reformed the calendar. Its painters were at work in the same decades as the painters of the late Renaissance in Italy.