The long river of history is running endlessly, there are calm waves, there are also waves, let Xiaobian take you into history and understand history.
The Yuanmingyuan is the most famous imperial garden during the Qing Dynasty, he is located in the northwest suburbs of Beijing, originally a garden given to Yongzheng by the Kangxi Emperor, the emperor of the Qing Dynasty would come here every summer to listen to the government and deal with military and political affairs, so it also had the reputation of a summer palace. The Yuanmingyuan has been expanded and built by the emperors yongzheng, Qianlong, Jiaqing and Daoguang, forming a "garden of ten thousand gardens" covering an area of 3.5 square kilometers, a construction area of 200,000 square meters, and more than 150 scenes in the garden.
We all know that in the late Qing Dynasty, the Qing government's national strength was weak and the country's development was slow, while western countries had already enjoyed the power brought by advanced science and technology by virtue of the industrial revolution. And the bad thing is that they are not satisfied with their own development, and they also covet other countries. China, a large eastern power with a vast land and abundant resources, was thus targeted by the Western powers.
The Yuanmingyuan was built from the last years of the Kangxi Dynasty and has been crystallized by generations of national treasures, beautiful and innumerable rare treasures, which have greatly stimulated the greed of the invaders. They plundered wildly, and even fought among themselves in order to rob each other of the treasures, some moved away the cloisonné porcelain bottles, some took away the treasure stones, some took the precious calligraphy and paintings, they even brought marijuana bags, large carts to carry, the countless treasures of the Yuanmingyuan were plundered, and those treasures that could not be moved, they smashed them with axes and hammers. The once palatial Yuanmingyuan has become full of devastation.
Britain, France, the United States and Russia were like bandits, and they began to carry the treasure after the zhengda Guangming Hall in the Yuanmingyuan, and the Yuanmingyuan was looted. These treasures, which embody the wisdom and blood and sweat of the Chinese people, became the "booty" of the Anglo-French coalition army, some were auctioned, some were dedicated to the british and French emperors, and some were exiled to the major museums in Europe.
In addition to the large-scale looting of the British and French troops, there were countless things that they destroyed and ruined, and all kinds of silk satin and embroidered robes were thrown to the ground. Some soldiers smashed all the furniture with axes, took off the gems on them and took them away, and for those things that could not be taken away, the soldiers took wooden sticks and smashed them all. After a few days of looting, this beautiful garden has been devastated. Finally, the British commander James Bruce made up a grandiose reason, saying that their British expatriates and sirs had been imprisoned here, and they burned the Yuanmingyuan to the ground.
When James Bruce returned to England, he was rewarded by the Queen of England and was soon promoted to governor of India. James Bruce was also very arrogant in India, plundering local cultural relics, but only a year later, his retribution came, and the man who ordered the burning of the Yuanmingyuan was called Erjin. As a sinner who destroyed this garden of art, he did not end well. Although he was rewarded by Queen Victoria for this, the good times did not last long, and after just over a year, he died violently, only 52 years old.
In 1900, the British published "James Erkin Commentary" said: Erjin died in the Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, Dharamsala town, which is a lightning-prone area in northern India, one day the room where he lived was suddenly hit by lightning and caught fire, Erjin was in a hurry to suffer a heart attack, too late to escape, he was buried in the sea of fire. Echoing the old Chinese adage, "Those who play with fire will set themselves on fire," Erjin deserves it.
Well, today's sharing ends here, and we'll see you next time