Many of China's ancient buildings were in danger of being destroyed before Lin Huiyin and Liang Sicheng started to document them in the 1930s. The husband and wife team were among the first people to work on preserving these buildings in China, and they are also the most well-known. Their efforts have inspired generations of people to speak out for architecture that is threatened by rapid development.
Becoming China's best architectural historians was not an easy task. The buildings they wanted to save were centuries old and often located in distant parts of the country. In many cases, they had to travel through dangerous areas in the Chinese countryside to reach them. During the 1930s, exploring remote areas in China meant traveling on muddy, poorly maintained roads by mule or on foot. Inns(客栈) were often dirty, food could be polluted, and there was always a risk of violence from rebels, soldiers, and robbers.
Their greatest discovery was the Temple of Buddha's Light in Wutai County, Shanxi Province. The breathtaking wooden temple was rebuilt in 857 A. D. , making it the oldest building known in China at the time.
Liang and Lin crawled into the temple's most forbidding, forgotten areas to determine its age. One area they explored was inhabited by thousands of bats and millions of bedbugs, covered in dust and littered with dead bats. "In complete darkness and among awful smell, hardly breathing, with thick masks covering our noses and mouths, we measured, drew, and took pictures with flashlights for several hours. When we finally came out to take a breath of fresh air, we found hundreds of bedbugs in our bag. We ourselves had been badly bitten. However, the importance and unexpectedness of our find made those hours the happiest of my years hunting for ancient architecture." Liang wrote about this experience in a book called "Liang and Lin: Partners in Exploring China's Architectural Past".
