The Forbidden City is the royal palace of the Ming and Qing dynasties in China, also known as the "Forbidden City", located in the center of the central axis of Beijing, is the architectural essence of the ancient Chinese court, the Forbidden City in Beijing is centered on the three major halls, covering an area of 720,000 square meters, with a construction area of about 150,000 square meters, there are more than 70 large and small palaces, about 9,000 houses, is one of the largest and most complete preserved wooden structure ancient buildings in the world.
The Forbidden City in Beijing began construction in the fourth year of Ming Chengzu Yongle, based on the Nanjing Forbidden City, and was completed in the eighteenth year of Yongle, so what are the stories about the construction of the Forbidden City?
Why 9999 half houses?
It is said that at the beginning of the construction of the Forbidden City, the Yongle Emperor Zhu Di had ordered the construction of 10,000 houses to show the grandeur of the Forbidden City, but on the night when he had just ordered it, Zhu Di had a dream, he dreamed that he was summoned by the Jade Emperor, and the Jade Emperor reprimanded him for not being compared with the Heavenly Garden, after all, you are the Son of Heaven, Zhu Di knew that the original palace of the Heavenly Garden was 10,000 houses, so he hurriedly knelt down and said: "Don't dare, the subject must change", the Jade Emperor listened and said: "I will give you a piece of the Heavenly Stone Town Palace, seventy-two earth fires and thirty-six days to protect your peace." Zhu Di woke up from the dream, he went to yao Guangxiao, explained his dream, Yao Guangxiao said: "So it seems, the design drawing needs to be changed", and then changed the number of palaces to 9999 and a half, so that it can not offend the heavens, but also save the face of the royal family, so Zhu Di asked Yao Guangxiao, what is the heavenly stone? What is the Seventy-Two Hells? What is Thirty-Six Days? Yao Guangxiao said: "There are seventy-two drainage ditches in the imperial palace, this is the seventy-two earth brakes, there are 18 cylinders of gold next to the Taihe Hall, this is the Thirty-six Heavenly Gang, and there is a carved dragon stone in the center of the steps of the main gate of the Taihe Hall, which is the Heavenly Stone." Zhu Di was very happy after listening to it, but in fact, in order not to hurt the people and money, the Forbidden City actually built 8707 houses.
Difficult construction process
Yongle four years, Zhu Di under the edict to Nanjing as a model to build the Beijing Imperial Palace and city walls, Zhu Di sent people and horses to all parts of the country to mine valuable wood and stone, and then transported to Beijing, it is said that the preparation work alone, it lasted 11 years, to know that in ancient times the traffic is very inconvenient, coupled with the precious Nan wood growing in the lofty mountains, the people risked into the mountains to collect wood, many people lost their lives, the future generations left a sentence "into the mountains a thousand, out of the mountains five hundred", it can be seen how difficult it is to pick wood, many people will never return, Because there are always tigers and beasts in the mountains, many people have died, in addition, mining the stone to build the palace is also very difficult, and now the largest Dan Majesty stone behind the Bohol Hall is mined in Fangshan, southwest of Beijing, it is recorded that tens of thousands of laborers dug a well every mile or so on both sides of the road, and when the temperature was low enough in the cold winter, it took water from the well to pave an ice road, and it took 28 days to send it to the palace, in addition, suzhou was also fired for the use of square bricks for royal buildings - gold bricks. At the same time, Shandong Linqing also had to transport tribute bricks to Beijing, so the Forbidden City was built after paying huge manpower, material resources, and financial resources, and the bricks and tiles did not know how many people's sweat was involved.
Several fires
In the thirty-sixth year of Ming Jiajing, a fire broke out in the Forbidden City, and the first three halls, Fengtian Gate, Wenwu Tower, and Noon Gate were all burned down. It was not until 40 years in Jiajing that all the reconstruction was completed. In the twenty-fifth year of the Ming Dynasty, a fire broke out in the Forbidden City, burning the first three halls and the last three palaces. The restoration works were not completed until the seventh year of the Apocalypse.
In 1644, Li Zicheng led an army to capture the city of Beijing, and the Ming Dynasty fell, but Li Zicheng was soon defeated by the Qing army at Shanhaiguan, so Li Zicheng ordered the burning of the Forbidden City in the process of retreating to Shaanxi, and finally only the Wuying Hall, the Jianji Hall, the Yinghua Hall, the Nanxun Hall, the Surrounding Corner Tower and the Imperial Pole Gate were not burned, and the rest of the buildings were all destroyed. After Shunzhi moved the capital to Beijing, it began to repair the Forbidden City, and then it took 14 years to basically repair the Middle Road building, and it was not until the twenty-second year of Kangxi that the rest of the destroyed buildings of the Forbidden City were repaired, and it was not basically completed until the thirty-fourth year of Kangxi.
The Forbidden City has gone through more than 500 years, I don't know how many historical events I have witnessed, how many vicissitudes and vicissitudes, this ancient city does not know how many rises and downs, glory and humiliation.