Cau Dong Pagoda in Hanoi

Cau Dong Pagoda (Dong Mon Tu or Eastern Gate Pagoda) stands at No 38B Hang Duong Street, Hang Dao ward, Hoan Kiem district. It takes only a 5-minute walk from Sword Lake to reach the pagoda built nearly 1,000 years ago. Since it has undergone four overhauls (the latest one in 1817), its architecture reveals the style typical of the early years of the Nguyen Dynasty, in spite of some vestiges of the Ly Dynasty. The doors and rafters are all elaborately carved and engraved with patterns of dragons, tigers, flowers and leaves, clouds and water. The pagoda has some 60 statues, of which the Trinity statues carved in the early 18^th century are of great artistic value. Cau Dong Pagoda is dedicated to a general and his wife who lived under the Tran Dynasty. It also houses some steles nearly 400 years old and a bell 200 years old.