The Great Wall, as the largest world monument in ancient China, has always had an extremely special position in the eyes of our people.
From the perspective of literary and artistic workers, the existence of the Great Wall not only provides a large number of historical materials for literary and artistic workers, but also adds a deep legendary color to literature and art itself. Of course, as the first of the great projects of ancient times, the significance of the Great Wall has long been not limited to the literary and artistic circles.
But as the Great Wall has been used more and more times in the hands of literary and artistic workers, many people's influence on the Great Wall has changed from sublime to vulgar. It seems that the significance of the Existence of the Great Wall itself is to give those of us who come after us a chance to "brag and swing".
Especially after people gradually learned about the height of the Great Wall, their views on the Great Wall have also fallen into a downturn.
As far as the Badaling Great Wall in Beijing, which is the most complete in existence, its general wall height is only 780 centimeters. For this reason, many people have asked questions such as "what can a wall of such a small height resist?"
In fact, not to mention that the height of the Great Wall has reached a height of nearly eight meters, even if the height of the Great Wall is lower than this, it is enough to withstand all the classes we can imagine, and it can become a nightmare for foreign tribes. Of course, if someone had to take the tanks and armored vehicles developed by modern industry to touch the ancient Great Wall, then they could only do nothing.
Among the existing ancient books, we can see that the earliest history of the Great Wall can be traced back to the Western Zhou Dynasty nearly three thousand years ago. After overthrowing the Shang Dynasty in 1046 BC and establishing the Zhou Dynasty. Seven generations of descendants after King Wen of Zhou, King Ji of Zhou, began the Zhou Dynasty's war against the attacks of the northern nomads. At that time, due to the lack of effective means to deal with the nomadic warhorses in the Guanzhong region, the King of Zhou began to build the prototype of the Great Wall called "Lecheng" on the border line of the Zhou Dynasty. At that time, the Great Wall was just a tower-like "bunker".
With the intensification of the struggle for hegemony between the princes in the Spring and Autumn Period and the frequent wars between the various princely states, this kind of "Leh City" was also widely used by the princely states. By this time, the city wall between the "bunker" and the "bunker" slowly appeared.
By the Warring States period, the shape of the Great Wall had developed to a similar form to the Great Wall we see in modern times, but the height was only more than one person tall. The Walls of the Great Wall, built on flat ground during this period, played a more important role in leveling the "height difference" that existed between infantry and cavalry in battle. And because the Great Wall at this time was more built between the mountains, this height plus the height of the mountain was completely sufficient.
But as the saying goes, "there are policies on the top, countermeasures on the bottom", as more and more siege weapons are invented, the one- or two-meter-high wall has no role in the war. What's more, it is impossible for a large-scale battle to break out between the lofty mountains and mountains. So at this time, it is basically whoever has the shortest wall is more likely to be unlucky. As a result, in the short period of more than a hundred years when the Spring and Autumn Period developed into the Warring States, the wall of the Great Wall, which was originally only one meter or less than two meters high, was gradually raised to a height of four or five meters.
More than 200 years BEFORE THE BEGINNING EMPEROR UNIFIED THE WORLD, IN ORDER TO RESIST THE INVASION OF THE XIONGNU IN THE NORTH, HE BEGAN TO CONNECT THE ORIGINAL YAN AND ZHAO GREAT WALL. At this time, the four words "Great Wall" began to spread among the people gradually.
However, even at this time, the height of the Great Wall was only about five meters, far less tall and magnificent than the walls of the great cities recorded in ancient books.
Judging from the battles that took place during this period between the earth and the Great Wall, the nearly five-meter-high city wall not only perfectly compensated for the height difference between the warhorses and chariots and the infantry, but also made the bows and arrows of the archers form a very effective suppression of the cavalry. Take the most common "ten stone bow" in the Warring States period, its range is generally only more than 100 steps less than 200 steps away. Moreover, the penetrating power of the bow and arrow can only penetrate the leather armor. However, when shooting arrows downward from the head of the city, the effective range of the bow and arrow can not only be increased to a certain extent, but also the inclination formed by it can strengthen the penetration of the bow and arrow.
Although this increase is not as good as the strong crossbow at that time, it is already a very large increase compared to the bow and arrow that the average archer has.
After discovering this benefit, since the Qin Dynasty, when successive dynasties built the Great Wall, they naturally had a tacit understanding to repair the city wall higher and higher. Taking the ancient city of Shangqiu built by the Ming Dynasty as an example, although the part on the ground is not very high at present, the depth of the foundation of the ancient city has reached more than 20 meters. If it were not for the addition of a moat with a water storage capacity of about 400 square meters, I am afraid that the walls of the ancient city would have been much higher.
The walls of the city can be built very high, but the walls of the conventional defensive plate cannot reach this height. As a result, the height of the Great Wall that we see now is basically fixed between seven and eight meters.
Don't look at the walls of the Great Wall, which are only seven or eight meters high, but when fighting against foreign enemies, the role is surprisingly large. For example, during the Western Han Dynasty, the famous "Champion Hou" Huo Went ill, relying on the Great Wall that existed in Gansu Province, beat those Xiongnu people to "smell the huo color".
So that in the end, the Huns, who had no way to do anything about the Great Wall, could only turn their horses around and target the West, and began a centuries-long entanglement with the Vikings and Germans in the Western lands. Therefore, although the Great Wall is not high, it has also become a nightmare for foreigners and brought disaster to the West.
As the first military defense building in ancient times, the evolution history of the Great Wall is actually inseparable from China's ancient culture and military development.
Of course, this does not mean that the higher the walls of the Great Wall, the more developed the military power of ancient times. But this at least proves that in ancient times, the collective productivity and cluster wisdom of our people were no less than those of our contemporaries.
Just as the so-called wisdom of the working people is inexhaustible and inexhaustible, this can also be seen from the establishment of the Great Wall.
The Great Wall, which is less than 8 meters high, why is it a nightmare for foreigners? It also brought a catastrophe to the West
The Great Wall, which is less than 8 meters high, can resist what?