Yongping Era of the Eastern Han
According to records, the earliest monastery on Mount Wutai was built during the Yongping era of the Eastern Han (around the mid-first century CE) and was initially named "Dafu Lingjiu Temple," which is today's Xiantong Temple.
If this date is correct, it is roughly contemporaneous with the White Horse Temple in Luoyang and is one of China's earliest Buddhist temples.
A mountain becoming a "famous Buddhist mountain" is not something that happens overnight. It requires time, buildings, and people who walk up it generation after generation.
Tang Dynasty: The Wood Is Still There
The two most famous Tang-dynasty wooden structures on Mount Wutai are the main hall of Nanchan Temple (third year of Jianzhong, 782 CE) and the East Hall of Foguang Temple (eleventh year of Dazhong, 857 CE).
The main hall of Nanchan Temple is one of the earliest surviving wooden buildings in China.
That Tang-dynasty wood has survived to today depends on dryness, remoteness, and luck. They have never been rebuilt—and that is the hardest part.
The White Stupa of the Yuan Dynasty
The Great White Stupa of Tayuan Temple was built in the fifth year of Dade of the Yuan (1301 CE) and is recorded as having been designed by the Nepalese craftsman Araniko.
The stupa is white and can be seen from far away in the Taihuai valley. It is also the most easily remembered shape on Mount Wutai.
2009
In 2009, Mount Wutai was inscribed on the World Heritage List as a "cultural landscape."
The reason given was the relationship that its architecture and landscape, together with Buddhist culture, have formed over a long period on this highland.
This statement is quite academic. Put in one sentence: this mountain has been changed, and it has also been left behind.
The Weight of Time
One thousand six hundred years is a length hard to imagine. It means that some of the wood still standing today is older than the national age of most countries.
It also means that the mountain path you walk today may be the same one that many people have walked for over a thousand years.