A Brief Introduction to The Forbidden City
The Forbidden City, Versailles, Buckingham Palace, Great Kremlin Palace and White House are considered to be the top 5 palaces in the world.
The Forbidden City was initially built in 1406 and the project finished in 1420. In 1406, Zhudi, an emperor of Ming Dynasty, decided to move their capital from Nanjing to Beijing. Zhudi wanted a new home before the move, so the Forbidden City was to be built.
The Forbidden City Facts
- History: over 550 years
- Width: 753 meters
- Length: 961 meters
- Area: 725,000 square meters
- Number of Halls: 8707
- Height of City Wall: 12 meters
- Length of City Wall: 3400 meters
Why Visit The Forbidden City
You will never see how big the Forbidden City is unless see it by your own eyes.
You can feel the majesty of ancient Chinese dynasties in the Forbidden City.
You can see over 350,000 ancient royal cultural relics in the Forbidden City.
American president Barack Obama visited the Forbidden City on November 17th, 2009, why not you?
Architectures In The Forbidden City
The architectures in the Forbidden Citywere generally divided into two parts. The ones located to the south of Qianqing Gate were called “Outside Halls”, and the ones located to the north of Qiangqing Gate were called “Inside Halls”.
Outside Halls
The Outside Halls, where emperors held morning meetings. were centralized by Taihe Hall (Hall of Supreme Harmony), Zhonghe Hall (Hall of Central Harmony) and Baohe Hall (Hall of Preserving Harmony).
Taihe Hall (Jinluan Hall)
Taihe Hall, also known as Jinluan Hall, is located on the axis from south to north of the Forbidden City.
24 emperors in Qing Dynasty or Ming Dynasty held their enthronements in Taihe Hall. Besides, Taihe Hall was also the place to hold emperors’ weddings, ceremonies for going out for battles and celebration for Chinese New Years.
Taihe Hall, which covers an area of 2377 square meters, and whose height is 35.05 meters, is the largest hall in the Forbidden City. There is a large terrace in front of the hall. A sundial, a Jialiang (used for metrology), a pair of bronze turtles, a pair of bronze cranes and 18 bronze tripods can be seen on the terraces. In ancient China, they were all the symbols of royalty.
Taihe Hall is not only the largest hall in the Forbidden City, but also the most important one. It can be see from the 10 animals carved on the top of the hall, which are a Chinese dragon, a phoenix, a lion, a Pegasus, a hippocampus, Suanni (on of dragon’s sons in Chinese legends), a Jiayu (a kind of beast lives in seas in Chinese legends), a Xiezhi (an animal who can tell right from wrong in Chinese legends), a cattle and a Hangshi (a kind of small animal which can defeat monsters). In ancient China, the more animals a hall had, the more important it was. There are only 7 animals carved on Zhonghe Hall and 9 on Baohe Hall.
Zhonghe Hall
Zhonghe Hall, initially built in AD 1420, is located between Taihe Hall and Baohe Hall. Emperors often did preparation work in Zhonghe Hall before big ceremonies or fetes.
In Chinese language, Zhonghe means no discrimination against anyone. In Chinese people’s mind, it is the most important to be successful.
Zhonghe Hall covers an area of 580 square meters. There are two Chinese unicorns at both sides of emperors’ seat. It’s said a Chinese unicorn can run 9000 kilometers in one day, and it can speak all the languages in the world and knows everything in the world.
Baohe Hall
Baohe Hall covers an area of 1240 square meters. There is a huge stone carving of Chinese dragon behind the hall. The stone carving is 16.57 meters long, 3.07 meters wide, 1.7 meters high and its weight reaches 250 tons. The stone was moved from Dashiwo, Fangshan County, which is 77.1 kilometers to the Forbidden City. In order to transport the stone, over 10 thousand people were summoned. The whole transportation needed nearly one month.
In 1789, Baohe Hall became the place to hold the highest government examination. The examination papers were designed by emperors. Top ten students’ examination papers would be viewed by emperors. Top three students would all be appointed as important government officials.
In 1904 the last examination was held at Baohe Hall, and then, the feudal examination, which had a history of 1300 years, was abolished.
Inside Halls
The Inside Halls of Forbidden City, centralized by Qianqing Palace (Palace of Heavenly Purity), Jiaotai Hall (Hall of Safety and Communication) and Kunning Palace (Palace of Peace and Harmony ), were royal living areas.
Qianqing Palace
The Qianqing Palace, covers an area of 1400 square meters, was the place for emperors to handle daily government affairs.
A wooden plaque written “正大光明” (zheng da guang ming) is hanging above the seat of emperor. It means emperors judge everything without any prejudice. There is another interesting thing about the plaque. In order avoid the fights for the throne among princes, emperor would write his successor’s name in a box and hang it behind the plaque. After emperor’s death, a minister would open the box and tell the whole country who would be next emperor. In this way, nobody but the only emperor at the time knew who would be his successor, so his sons would have no target to fights against.
Jiaotai Hall
The Jiaotai Hall is located between Qianqing Palace and Kunning Palace. Queens’ birthday celebrations were held here.
A chime clock, made in 1798, can be seen in the hall. It is still working nowadays.
Kunning Palace
Kunning Palace was initially built in 1420. In 1655, the emperor at that time decided to rebuild Kunning Palace according to the style of Qingning Palace, which was located in Shenyang, their hometown.
Lots of royal fetes were held in Kunning Palace
The Forbidden City Story
On a certain day of 1992, some tourists in the Forbidden City saw several odalisques were walking in heavy rain with lightning and thunder. Many of tourists even take several photos of the odalisques. The piece of news spread very quickly. At the very beginning, people believed there was something supernatural happened in the Forbidden City, but very soon, scientists explained that there is "iron oxide black" on the wall of the Forbidden City, which also exists in common video recorders. They also said that perhaps several hundred years ago, several odalisques were walking in heavy rain with lightning and thunder, like the certain day of 1992. Under such a condition, the wall had the same function with video recorders. So when the same weather appeared again in 1992, the wall worked like a video recorder once again.
The photo on the left is said to be one of the photos taken on the day of 1992, but nobody can be sure.