Legend has it that Wei Zheng once asked Tang Taizong Li Shimin, "Do you know why you are the emperor?" Tang Taizong roughly said many reasons, but all of them were rejected by Wei Zheng, and he asked Wei Zheng in desperation, "Then why do you say that I am the emperor?" Wei Zheng pointed to the dragon chair where Tang Taizong was sitting and said that because you were sitting on this dragon chair.
That is to say, the dragon chair has been a symbol of imperial power since ancient times, and the jade seal has the same status, and the dragon chair of the Forbidden City, that is, the dragon chair on the Golden Ruan Hall, is also only the emperor can sit, and now it is a valuable cultural relic, a few years ago there were reporters shooting how to clean the dragon chair, when there were 20 staff wearing blue clothing to deal with, they wore masks, holding soft brushes in their hands, gently sweeping the dust, the person in charge said that some corners still have to use cotton swabs to remove dust.
A dragon chair actually needs 20 people to clean, many people will ask, what kind of material is this dragon chair made of? So much emphasis?
According to historical records, the dragon chair of the Forbidden City is made of gold silk nan wood, purple trembling wood and other wood, using the carving process, the carving is very exquisite, the craftsmen will be 9 dragons coiled on the throne, the winding dragon body and dragon scales are clearly visible, but now after more than 500 years, quite fragile, so you must be careful when cleaning.
This dragon chair is different from other seats, with a circle chair back, and 4 hand-leaning columns, which are also carved with dragon figures, and the base is not the leg support of the ordinary chair, but the chair support. The entire dragon chair is two meters and five meters wide and more than one meter deep.
Many tourists before seeing, think it is made of pure gold, in fact, it is not so, this dragon chair is all made of wood, purple tremor wood as a frame, embedded birch board heart, gold silk Nan wood is also in it, after all the production is completed, and then painted with golden paint, the Forbidden City as the imperial palace of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, the Qing Emperor did not replace this dragon chair, even if it was burned during the Jiajing period of the Ming Dynasty, they are still used after repair.
It is said that the dragon chair of the Forbidden City, in fact, he has a very nice name, called "Xiu Xiu Golden Carved Dragon Wooden Chair", this dragon chair has always been a symbol of the emperor, even when empress Dowager Cixi of the Qing Dynasty was in power, she was influenced by feudal ideas, did not sit on it, but let Guangxu sit, but did not sit, but was sat for a while by foreigners when the Eight-Nation Alliance invaded China.
Later, after the fall of the Qing Dynasty, Yuan Shikai was proclaimed emperor, and when he wanted to sit on this dragon chair, he suddenly thought it was unlucky, so he moved all the furniture of the Taihe Hall to the storehouse, and ordered the reconstruction of a Western-style seat, which lowered the grade of the entire Taihe Hall because it looked uncoordinated.
Until after the liberation of the whole country, some Forbidden City experts found this Ming Dynasty dragon chair after looking around, after restoration, it has been placed in the Taihe Hall, and this dragon chair has witnessed what happened in the Ming and Qing dynasties through the smoke clouds of history, and has been handed down to this day.