Page type
Place
Qingjing Mosque (清净寺, "Mosque of Purity") on Tumen Street is one of the most significant surviving material witnesses to the Maritime Silk Road. Built in 1009 CE (Song dynasty) by Arab merchants then living permanently in Quanzhou, it is the oldest Islamic building of any kind still standing in China and one of the 22 sites that make up Quanzhou's UNESCO World Heritage inscription.
What survives:
- The main gate — a 20-metre-high granite arch copying the design of the Al-Aqbariya in Damascus, pure Arab. Walk through it and you are suddenly in 11th-century Syria.
- The open-roofed prayer hall — the original roof collapsed in a 1607 earthquake and was never rebuilt; what's left is the rectangular stone floor, the mihrab niche towards Mecca, and the surrounding arcaded walls.
- The Islamic inscription stele with the Ming Yongle Emperor's 1407 decree protecting Quanzhou's Muslim community.
A small modern prayer hall to the east is where Quanzhou's Muslims actually pray today — the oldest part is preserved as a heritage site.
Practical: 3 CNY admission. Open 08:00–18:00. Modest dress. Five minutes' walk from the Confucius Temple — plan them together. Photography fine outside prayer times.