Ancient Chinese legend abounds with stories of dragons flying up to heaven. The story behind the coiled dragons found on dragon pillars, apparently, is that they are there because they haven’t yet ascended to heaven.

You can tell about when a dragon pillar was made by looking at the style of the carving. Generally speaking, the oldest dragon pillars are relatively small in diameter and the carving was not so intricate, while more modern ones are thicker and feature very elaborate carving. Experts distinguish between four main periods:

Early period: This period includes columns made any time prior to about the middle of the Qing dynasty, i.e., before the mid to late 18th century. It was one dragon per column. The columns were generally comparatively thin and the carving simple.

Early-middle period: In the middle years of the Qing dynasty the dragons were still carved in relatively low relief, but sculptors had begun by this time to carve the dragons’ claws in the round, extended free of the pillar itself. The body had also become more sharply contorted by this time as well.

Early-modern period: By the late 19th or early 20th century temple builders were using columns with an octagonal cross section. A column fashioned in this period will have one dragon on it, and is very likely to be decorated with carvings of cloud patterns, floral patterns, and human figures.

Modern period: Dragon pillars became increasingly ornate after Taiwan came under Japanese colonial rule in 1895, with Greek-style capitals, shafts twice as thick as in earlier years, and a surfeit of little details.