Songyang Academy is one of the oldest institutions of higher learning in China and one of the major four academies of the Song Dynasty, the others being Yingtian in Henan Province, Yuelu in Hunan Province and Bailudong in Jiangxi Province. Famous Confucian scholars such as SiMaguang, FanZhongyan, ZhuXi and ChengHao used to give lectures here.

Now in an area of more than 10,000 square meters, there exist 100 rooms and over 70 steles kept in the stele corridor. In the courtyard there are two primitive cypresses; Emperor Wu of the Western Han Dynasty praised them as "Generals."

In history, Songyang Academy was jointly dominated by Buddhism and Daoism at first, later by the Confucianism exclusively. During the ages from the Later Zhou Dynasty (951 – 959 A.D.) of the Five Dynasties Period (907 – 959 A.D.) to the Song Dynasty (960 – 1279 A.D.), Chenghao and Cheng Xi, two great masters of the Luo School of the Confucianism, spread their theories here with hundreds of students. First built in 484 A.D., it had been remedied and extended for several times in different dynasties, later developed into an academy of a large scale with an air of simplicity and elegance.

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