Forbidden City Guogun - the largest and most famous palace complex in the world, is located in Beijing. He served as the residence of twenty-four powerful rulers of two dynasties of the Celestial Empire - Ming and Qing.
Today, going to the Forbidden City, you need to go through only three gates: Tiananmen, Duanmen and, finally, the main gate of the palace - Umen. In former times for foreign ambassadors and officials the way to the palace was longer: they passed through five gates.
All decoration and decoration of the Forbidden City is permeated with philosophical and religious ideas and principles of China, including the fact that the emperor, despite all his greatness, should be fair and wise.
A bit of history
The construction of the Forbidden City began in 1406. The emperor, who gave an indication of its construction, was Zhu di. There is a legend that the project of the Forbidden City had a dream of one of the monks, and he told the prince about him, who later became emperor.
The main material used for the construction of the palace is wood, as well as brick, marble, tiles. Almost all buildings inside the complex are single-storey, and massive roofs rest on powerful columns, this design is most resistant to earthquakes. The facades of all the main buildings are facing south - thus the Forbidden City turned its back on all the hostile forces of the north. The main entrance is also on the south side.
The Forbidden City is not just a beautiful name, it is also a statement of fact .Ordinary people here did not have access to .In the closed palace lived the family of the ruling emperor and their numerous servants .Without permission to enter the city was banned under pain of a slow and painful execution - although the most curious sometimes did not scare even this .However, not only curiosity forced people to enter the Forbidden City, for example, the last emperor of the Ming dynasty was driven to suicide by residents who broke into the palace, who were angry with excessive taxes and hunger .
On the Qing dynasty, the last ruling dynasty in the Forbidden City, according to legend, a curse was imposed - the Qing house will fall by the hand of a woman. In general, it happened. The former concubine of Cixi was ruled by China after her husband's death, until her nephew, the two-year-old Pu-Yi, became her successor. The Kid became the last emperor and owner of the Forbidden City. In 1912, at the age of five, he abdicated, but remained in the palace.
Interesting Facts
According to legend, there are ten thousand rooms in the palace of the Heavenly Emperor. The palace of the son of Heaven, the so-called emperors of China, should be at least a bit more modest, so as not to outshine the Heavenly ruler. So it occupies an area of 72 hectares, on which there are about eight hundred buildings and a total of only 9.999 rooms.
The city is surrounded by a high wall and a water-filled moat - the Jinshuihe Canal (Golden Water River). Several moats were thrown through the ditch - the central bridges were intended only for the members of the imperial family, the following - for higher military and civil officials, and the last ones were called public and any inhabitant of the Forbidden City could pass through them, regardless of their rank and origin.
On the territory of the Forbidden City there are many beautiful and elegant buildings. Pavilions, gazebos, galleries, as well as lakes, river, gardens. And their names, as a rule, are not inferior in any way to exquisite appearance - for example, the pavilion of Contact of Heaven and Earth, the Gate of Heavenly Purity or Arbor, where the arrival of spring is seen.
The Forbidden City was repeatedly rebuilt after fires, devastations and robberies. However, he tried to reproduce the image with the utmost precision, so that what we can see there is not very different from the original view of the palace.
The collection of valuable exhibits is replenished year after year, has already reached a million. The main part of the exposition is made up of objects of painting, books, bronze ware, imperial clothes and jewelry, made with amazing skill.
The Forbidden City divides the central axis, the length of eight kilometers. In the center stands the pavilion of Taihdian (Higher Harmony), whose height is almost forty meters. For many centuries it remained the tallest building in Beijing, because during the time of the empire it was not allowed to erect buildings above it - the prohibition did not apply only to temples. In the center of the pavilion is the Throne, a symbol of the power of the emperor on earth.