The Forbidden City

The Forbidden City was the Chinese sovereign palace from the Ming Dynasty(1420) to the end of the Qing dynasty(1912). It located in the center of Beijing, China. It apportioned as the home of emperors and their family as well as the liturgical and political center of Chinese government. It was built from the year of 1406 to 1420, and it consists of 980 buildings and covers 72 ha. It has a great collection of artwork and artifacts that were built upon the imperial collections of the Ming and Qing dynasties.

In the year of 1369, Zhu Yuanzhang created Ming Dynasty and claimed the be the emperor. He named Ying Tian Fu to Nanjing and Kaifeng to Beijing; he started to build the Capital in Fengyang, Beijing. Because all the people went to build other Palaces, Nanjing Palace was called to stop since there were not enough people. Eight years later, Emperor Zhu gave up the projects of concentration camps and focused on the construction of Nanjing Palace. Then in the next few years, he let people build many temples inside of the Nanjing Palace until he died. Then the later emperors of the Ming Dynasty continued to construct it and made it much bigger. The palace was burned at the end of the Ming Dynasty and was rebuilt during Qing Dynasty.

The Forbidden City consists of many different parts. There are so many Palaces so that you could not walk through the whole Forbidden City for a whole day. The main palace is called Taihe Palace, and emperors often held big ritual ceremonies inside of it. Yangxin Palace is the place where emperors lived; it has complete facilities and comfortable space to relax. Many of the palaces are residential places for emperors’ wives. The emperors ranked their wives, and the bigger Palaces were for those wives who had higher ranks.

After the Revolution of 1911 in China, the Forbidden City belonged to the state; Puyi, the last emperor in Chinese history, was allowed to live inside of the palace temporarily. In the year of 1942, Feng Yuxiang launched a coup in Beijing and expelled Puyi. At the same time, he established the Aftermath Committee of Qing Dynasty and took over the Forbidden City. On October 10th, 1925, the Palace Museum was formally established; it also opened to all the people who want to visit. The Forbidden City has been renamed to “Gu Gong”, which means the “Past Palace.” With the downfall of the Qing Dynasty, many buildings in Gu Gong collapsed. In the year of 1961 after the People’s Republic of China has established, the State Department announced that Gu Gong was the first one of the Major Historical and Culture Site Protected at the National Level. In the 1950s to 1960s, it has been maintained and repaired massively. In 1987, Gu Gong had been a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

Now we can see visitors from all over the world come to visit the Forbidden City every day. It became one of the worthiest sites to visit when people comes to Beijing.

The Great Wall

The Great Wall

Introduction

The Great Wall is the crystallization of Chinese nation's sweat and wisdom. Whether in ancient times or in modern times, the Great Wall has a very important role and significance. In ancient times, the Great Wall is important in military, agriculture and economic; in modern times, the Great Wall represents a spirit and culture, is the national soul of the Chinese nation, and the Great Wall is a tourist destination.

History

The spring and Autumn and the Warring States period, all the governors in order to defense against invasion of other countries. They construct the beacon towers and use walls to connected to form the earliest Great Wall. And it got the expansion during the Han, Ming Dynasty and so on. In the Han Dynasty, the emperors extended the Great Wall far into today's western China to protect Silk Road trade. It can be said that it has not stopped building since the spring and autumn and Warring States period to the Qing Dynasty for more than 2000 years’ history. The Great Wall starts from east Shanhaiguan to the east Gansu Jiayuguan. From east to west through 10 provinces. It is up to ten thousand kilometers, so it is also called "the ten thousand kilometers Wall". According to records, Qin Shihuang used nearly million labor to build the Great Wall. It is 1/20 of the total population. Because there was no machinery at that time, all labors used their hands to build it. The working environment is mountains and cliffs; it was a very difficult work.

Significance

 military significance:

The great wall is the greatest military defense project in the ancient history. It is not a simple isolated walls, but from point to line, from line to surface, connected everything into a tight network to form a complete defense system.

Agriculture and economy significance:

The Great Wall helped maintain the agricultural social peace and security in ancient china. In the 2000 years of history, the Great Wall helped the rulers in ancient China repel the invasion of the northern nomads for a lot of times. It created a relatively peaceful environment for the agricultural economy’s survival and development and also made people's lives more stable.

The Great Wall is the symbol of human civilization

The Great Wall is the largest human cultural heritage in the world; it is also the largest cultural relics. Whether its occupies space or its history has an important position in the history of human civilization. We often say that the Great Wall is the symbol of the Chinese nation. In fact, the the Great Wall is also a symbol of human civilization. Nowadays, the Great Wall has lost the role of military defense. So it is today's value is that people have to feel the history of civilization. As long as there are people in the world, there will have this demand, and the Great Wall will live forever. When the foreign tourists come to China to climb the Great Wall, they most interest in a problem, which is why we wanted to build the Great Wall. What kind of force can support such a hard labor? For this problem, I think the Great Wall is the symbol of peace. This is a nation that loves peace and not willing to fight, so we will invest that much manpower and material resources to repair the Great Wall.

Silk

Silk


Silk is a pure and natural fiber that made only by a few sorts of insects. They produce them and people make them into different sort of clothes or accessories. In Ancient China, silk is one of the most classical representatives of Chinese culture because China is also the origin of silk, which made silk become a unique material for global people during that period.

Silk basically comes from the silkworm and different colors. When they are growing, the silk was made. People pick the silk from their shell and use them to make beautiful clothes. Silk is so smooth and soft that most people like it very much. It is natural rather than artificial, it is beautiful and show one’s great taste of clothes. In addition, they used varied colors to those white silk in order to make some different pattern on clothes, such as phoenix, dragon, flowers, birds, etc. They are all the symbols of good luck and peace, that is also the reason that why silk was getting such popular before time. Silk is unexpectedly warm especially during the winter. Although it seems to be really soft and light, it actually provides a great advantage which is it could separate the warmth and cold outside and inside the body. Through this advantage, many people prefer silk made clothes because it is really suited for wearing during the whole year. That is also the point the people are more likely to buy silk rather than clothes that were made by wool and cotton, those relatively uncomfortable materials.

Silk also became the method to communicate with other countries, namely, it was silk which spread Chinese culture to other countries. In the history records, there is a road called silk road, which literally means a road made by silk. During Song dynasty,  people trade silk to other countries in Europe in order to improve own countries’ economy and develop their own culture. Europeans really liked silk and they discovered that it is really smooth that is the new material that they never saw before. Because of the beautiful decorations on the silk clothes, they were attracted by them so that pay a lot of money to buy them. During this period, Asian countries also introduced a lot of ideas and religions to European countries such as Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. Asian countries also brought a lot of food and spices to Europe in order to let them taste the new stuff that European never had before. That is also the way to improve the relationship between several countries within one continental. Many artistic influences were transmitted via the Silk Road, particularly through Central Asia, where Hellenistic, Iranian, Indian and Chinese influences could intermix. Greco-Buddhist art represents one of the most vivid examples of this interaction. Silk was also a representation of art. This is because silk served as a religious symbol, and most importantly, silk was used as currency for trade along the silk road.

In nowadays society, silk is being a symbol of fashion and popularity. A lot of people prefer to buy silk accessories and clothes. Those brands such as Alexander McQueen, Burberry, Prada Yves Saint Laurent, and even Hermes, they make scarves by using silk and cashmere. A lot of singers, actors wear those silk scarves and silk outwearing to go to a lot of great ceremonies such as Grammy music awards, Emmy awards, etc. Silk is not only the copyright of China but also a sort of culture for every country in this continent. Silk begins to become a cosmopolitan symbol of fashion in both physical and mental perspectives.

Consequently, silk became a global copyright that suit for everyone in this world and it demonstrate the international character for whole 5 000 years Chinese culture.

Gunpowder

Gunpowder, is a chemical explosive widely used in firearms and fireworks. It is a mixture of sulfur, charcoal, and potassium nitrate. 

Gunpowder was first invented in China when taoists tried to create the portion to mortality. It was around 300AD when the recipe of gunpowder first appeared in paper works written by a chin dynasty scientist. Gunpowder made its way into the mass population's attention in around 700AD when it was used in firework displays. Finally by 904AD, gunpowder's future in military usage was discovered by Chinese inventors and it was made into different types of weapons.

The first use of gunpowder in warfare was in the form of rocket. Small packages of gunpowder were wrapped in paper or bamboo and then attached to arrows. These arrows would be lit with a fuse, so that they could become an incendiary, and set targets on fire. Later, metal barrels were used for fire lances that propelled gunpowder bombs intended to burn targets. That is the ancestor of the modern gun and canons.

Gunpowder travelled its way toward the west as the Mongols learned the secret of gunpowder when it conquered part of China. As expand its empire from Southern China to parts of Western Europe. The knowledge of gunpowder was spread through the world as Europeans, Indians and Muslims who fought against or lived under the ruling of the Mongols acquired the knowledge of gunpowder,

After the decline of the Mongol empire, gunpowder was soon made into weapons used to wage wars against each other, the technology involved soon evolved and new types of weapons appeared.

Europe took up the leading role in the advancement of forearm technology after 14 century. Unlike other regions of the world, the ancient Europe was scattered with small city states that constantly waged war against each other. The benefits of firearms were soon adopted by European armies since firearms is comparatively cheaper than the armor and horses used in middle age warfare. Also, the destructive power of guns and cannons made the castles if the old time defenseless. Soon all the troops in Europe were equipped with firearm.

Yet another benefit of gun is that it does no acquire a high level of skill to master. Any man can learn how to use gun in a short time. Especially in ancient Europe where only the rich can afford war gear and education. It gave ordinary man the power to defeat even the beast solider in the world, so guns were soon used to by the common people to break down the feudal system and the religious oppression. Which eventually lead to the age of enlightenment and revolutions that freed the thoughts of all mankind.

Guns and cannons were also used by european navy forces and they granted them the dominance of the sea. These naval empires eager to find the sea route to the east, and during their searching they discovered a whole new piece of continent. Colonies were built not only in the new continent, but also in the land of Asia and Africa as Europeans made their way to the lands and conquered them with their advanced firearms and large army. This further spread out the advanced technology to all parts of world and built the foundation of today's world. 

The influence of gunpowder is enormous, it changed the way people fight and think, it altered the social structure and encouraged the age of enlightenment. It lead to the discovery of the new land and the spread of technology. It is one of the forefathers of today's world.