In the northwest direction of Beijing, there are mountains and rivers, the scenery is excellent, and the nobles of the imperial palace often visit here. In the fourteenth year of Qianlong, in order to solve the problem of water supply in the capital, the Qianlong Emperor began to dredge the West Lake (Kunming Lake was called in the Ming Dynasty). In the fifteenth year of Qianlong, the dredging of the West Lake was completed, coinciding with the birthday of the empress dowager, and the Qianlong Emperor ordered people to build a royal garden here to wish his mother a birthday, and gave the lake a proper name, the mountain was renamed Wanshou Mountain, and the lake was renamed Kunming Lake. Fifteen years later, the construction of the Qingyi Garden (the name of the Summer Palace before the Guangxu Emperor) was completed.
Summer palace
There is a saying in old Beijing to describe the Summer Palace, called Fushan Shouhai. If you look down from the air, you will find that the entire Wanshou Mountain is like a bat with open wings, the ancient bat is the same as the gospel, many places will use bats to represent blessings, and Kunming Lake is like a big shou peach, implying the Blessing of the Qianlong Emperor to his mother.
Wanshou Mountain - Buddha Xiang Pavilion
The emperors who lived deep in the city of Beijing naturally admired the beautiful scenery of Jiangnan, the Qianlong Emperor six times under jiangnan, many gardens, gardens and other buildings in Beijing and the Forbidden City are also derived from the layout of Jiangnan. Take the Summer Palace, for example, the entire West Causeway of the Summer Palace is completely imitated by the Su Causeway of Hangzhou's West Lake, and there are six bridges on the West Causeway of the Summer Palace, named: Jiehu Bridge, Fengfeng Bridge, Jade Belt Bridge, Mirror Bridge, LianQiao, And LiuQiao, which are also imitated from the stone bridges on the Su Causeway. Only the name of this Kunming Lake makes people feel their heads, but it is reminiscent of Kunming, Yunnan, thousands of miles away, so is there some connection between the two?
West Causeway - Jingming Bridge
As early as the Han Dynasty, in order to resist the Xiongnu and protect the newly opened Silk Road, Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty expanded the Great Wall on the basis of the Great Wall of Qin, from Liaodong in the east to Lop Nur in Xinjiang in the west, with a total length of more than 10,000 kilometers, but this still could not stop the Xiongnu from going south to rob the past caravans. So Emperor Wu of Han planned to reopen a trade route to avoid the harassment of the Xiongnu, starting from present-day Sichuan and passing through Yunnan to India, but the new Silk Road was obstructed in Yunnan, and the ancient Kunming State refused to let the caravan pass. Emperor Wu of Han was furious and wanted to send troops to attack the ancient kunming state. At that time, the State of Kunming was behind Dianchi Lake, and if it wanted to take the State of Kunming, it would have to cross the Dianchi Lake, and the army of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty was not accustomed to water warfare and could not advance. Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty ordered people to dig a huge pool of water on the west side of the capital Chang'an City, named Kunming Lake, and let the soldiers practice day and night, so that the army could get used to water warfare and conquer Kunming.
Cixi Waterway
The Qianlong Emperor learned from the deeds of the ancients and renamed the West Lake Kunming Lake, hoping that he could become a monarch who opened up the territory and expanded the territory like Emperor Wu of han. Later, the Eight-Power Alliance invaded China, and the Summer Palace was destroyed twice (the first was the Invasion of China by the British and French Coalition Forces). However, Empress Dowager Cixi rebuilt the Summer Palace, and once in the name of cultivating naval talents, but the garden was repaired, or it became a place of cultivation for Lafayette, and did not make any contribution to the Navy.