Niujie Mosque

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The Niujie Mosque (Chinese: 牛街清真寺; pinyin: niújiē qīngzhēnsì), also called the Cow Street Mosque is the oldest mosque in Beijing, China. It was built in 996 and reconstructed as well as enlarged under the Qing Emperor Kangxi (1622-1722).

The Mosque is located in Beijing's Xuanwu District, the spiritual centre for the 10,000 Muslims living in the vicinity and it is the biggest and oldest one in Beijing. Niujie(Cow Street) in Xuanwu District, where the mosque is located, is the largest area inhabited by Muslims in Beijing.

The Cow Street Mosque covers an area of approximately 6000 square meters. The mosque is a mixture of Islamic and Chinese cultures. From the outside, its architecture shows traditional Chinese influence while the inside has mostly Islamic decorations. The mosque, built out of timber, is home to some important cultural relics and tablets such as the upright tablet of an emperor's decree proclaimed in 1694 during the Qing Dynasty.

[edit] History

The Cow Street Mosque, the largest of all the mosques in Beijing, was built in 996 during the Liao Dynasty (916-1125). It was rebuilt in 1442 in the Ming Dynasty and expanded in 1696 under the Qing Dynasty. It is now one of the major mosques in north China.

The mosque has undergone three renovations since the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, respectively in 1955, 1979 and 1996.

The Beijing Municipal Government has started rebuilding a residential area mainly inhabited by Muslims. The work on the 35.9-hectare area around Niujie Street will involve moving 7,500 families, 58 percent of whom are Muslims. The project will turn Cow Street into a Muslim-style commercial street. The area will be home to multi-storey buildings, schools, kindergartens and public facilities. Cow Street is presently a narrow street where most people live in old houses with a per capita floor space of 5. 1 square metres. In recent years, the Beijing Government has completed a number of infrastructure projects to improve water, [[electricity, heat and gas supplies there. They have launched a project to improve local people's living conditions through demolishing old and shabby houses and building new multi-storey buildings in the area in 1997.