1.
Wikiquote
–
Wikiquote is one of a family of wiki-based projects run by the Wikimedia Foundation, running on MediaWiki software. And to be as proper as possible in regard to the details of the quotations, though there are many online collections of quotations, Wikiquote is distinguished by being among the few that provide an opportunity for visitors to contribute. Wikiquote pages are cross-linked to articles about the personalities on Wikipedia. Initially, the project was created solely in English, an expansion to include additional languages was started in July 2004. As of September 2016, there are 89 versions, as of September 2016, thirty-one versions each have more than 1,000 articles. Sixty language versions have 100 or more articles, Wikimedia Foundation List of Wikiquote Projects by Language Official website
Wikiquote
–
Screenshot of the wikiquote.org home page
2.
World Heritage Site
–
A World Heritage Site is a landmark which has been officially recognized by the United Nations, specifically by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization. Sites are selected on the basis of having cultural, historical, scientific or some form of significance. UNESCO regards these sites as being important to the interests of humanity. The programme catalogues, names, and conserves sites of outstanding cultural or natural importance to the common culture, under certain conditions, listed sites can obtain funds from the World Heritage Fund. The program was founded with the Convention Concerning the Protection of the Worlds Cultural and Natural Heritage, since then,192 state parties have ratified the convention, making it one of the most adhered to international instruments. As of July 2016,1052 sites are listed,814 cultural,203 natural, in 1959, the governments of Egypt and Sudan requested UNESCO to assist their countries to protect and rescue the endangered monuments and sites. In 1960, the Director-General of UNESCO launched an appeal to the Member States for an International Campaign to Save the Monuments of Nubia, the campaign, which ended in 1980, was considered a success. The project cost $80 million, about $40 million of which was collected from 50 countries, the projects success led to other safeguarding campaigns, saving Venice and its lagoon in Italy, the ruins of Mohenjo-daro in Pakistan, and the Borobodur Temple Compounds in Indonesia. UNESCO then initiated, with the International Council on Monuments and Sites, the United States initiated the idea of cultural conservation with nature conservation. The International Union for Conservation of Nature developed similar proposals in 1968, the Convention came into force on 17 December 1975. As of June 2016, it has been ratified by 192 states, including 188 UN member states plus the Cook Islands, the Holy See, Niue, a country must first list its significant cultural and natural sites, the result is called the Tentative List. A country may not nominate sites that have not been first included on the Tentative List, next, it can place sites selected from that list into a Nomination File. The Nomination File is evaluated by the International Council on Monuments and Sites and these bodies then make their recommendations to the World Heritage Committee. There are ten selection criteria – a site must meet at least one of them to be included on the list, up to 2004, there were six criteria for cultural heritage and four criteria for natural heritage. In 2005, this was modified so there is now only one set of ten criteria. Nominated sites must be of outstanding value and meet at least one of the ten criteria. Thus, the Geneva Convention treaty promulgates, Article 53, PROTECTION OF CULTURAL OBJECTS AND OF PLACES OF WORSHIP. There are 1,052 World Heritage Sites located in 165 States Party, of these,814 are cultural,203 are natural and 35 are mixed properties
World Heritage Site
–
Site #252:
Taj Mahal, an example of cultural heritage site
World Heritage Site
–
Logo of the
United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
World Heritage Committee
World Heritage Site
–
Site #156:
Serengeti National Park, an example of natural heritage site
World Heritage Site
–
Site #274:
Historic Sanctuary of Machu Picchu, an example of mixed heritage site
3.
Geographic coordinate system
–
A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
Geographic coordinate system
–
Longitude lines are perpendicular and latitude lines are parallel to the equator.
4.
Chinese language
–
Chinese is a group of related, but in many cases mutually unintelligible, language varieties, forming a branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. Chinese is spoken by the Han majority and many ethnic groups in China. Nearly 1.2 billion people speak some form of Chinese as their first language, the varieties of Chinese are usually described by native speakers as dialects of a single Chinese language, but linguists note that they are as diverse as a language family. The internal diversity of Chinese has been likened to that of the Romance languages, There are between 7 and 13 main regional groups of Chinese, of which the most spoken by far is Mandarin, followed by Wu, Min, and Yue. Most of these groups are mutually unintelligible, although some, like Xiang and certain Southwest Mandarin dialects, may share common terms, all varieties of Chinese are tonal and analytic. Standard Chinese is a form of spoken Chinese based on the Beijing dialect of Mandarin. It is the language of China and Taiwan, as well as one of four official languages of Singapore. It is one of the six languages of the United Nations. The written form of the language, based on the logograms known as Chinese characters, is shared by literate speakers of otherwise unintelligible dialects. Of the other varieties of Chinese, Cantonese is the spoken language and official in Hong Kong and Macau. It is also influential in Guangdong province and much of Guangxi, dialects of Southern Min, part of the Min group, are widely spoken in southern Fujian, with notable variants also spoken in neighboring Taiwan and in Southeast Asia. Hakka also has a diaspora in Taiwan and southeast Asia. Shanghainese and other Wu varieties are prominent in the lower Yangtze region of eastern China, Chinese can be traced back to a hypothetical Sino-Tibetan proto-language. The first written records appeared over 3,000 years ago during the Shang dynasty, as the language evolved over this period, the various local varieties became mutually unintelligible. In reaction, central governments have sought to promulgate a unified standard. Difficulties have included the great diversity of the languages, the lack of inflection in many of them, in addition, many of the smaller languages are spoken in mountainous areas that are difficult to reach, and are often also sensitive border zones. Without a secure reconstruction of proto-Sino-Tibetan, the structure of the family remains unclear. A top-level branching into Chinese and Tibeto-Burman languages is often assumed, the earliest examples of Chinese are divinatory inscriptions on oracle bones from around 1250 BCE in the late Shang dynasty
Chinese language
–
The
Tripitaka Koreana, a Korean collection of the
Chinese Buddhist canon
Chinese language
–
Hànyǔ (Chinese) written in
traditional (left) and
simplified (right) characters
Chinese language
–
"
Preface to the Poems Composed at the Orchid Pavilion " by
Wang Xizhi, written in
semi-cursive style
5.
Hanyu Pinyin
–
Pinyin, or Hànyǔ Pīnyīn, is the official romanization system for Standard Chinese in mainland China, Malaysia, Singapore, and Taiwan. It is often used to teach Standard Chinese, which is written using Chinese characters. The system includes four diacritics denoting tones, Pinyin without tone marks is used to spell Chinese names and words in languages written with the Latin alphabet, and also in certain computer input methods to enter Chinese characters. The pinyin system was developed in the 1950s by many linguists, including Zhou Youguang and it was published by the Chinese government in 1958 and revised several times. The International Organization for Standardization adopted pinyin as a standard in 1982. The system was adopted as the standard in Taiwan in 2009. The word Hànyǔ means the language of the Han people. In 1605, the Jesuit missionary Matteo Ricci published Xizi Qiji in Beijing and this was the first book to use the Roman alphabet to write the Chinese language. Twenty years later, another Jesuit in China, Nicolas Trigault, neither book had much immediate impact on the way in which Chinese thought about their writing system, and the romanizations they described were intended more for Westerners than for the Chinese. One of the earliest Chinese thinkers to relate Western alphabets to Chinese was late Ming to early Qing Dynasty scholar-official, the first late Qing reformer to propose that China adopt a system of spelling was Song Shu. A student of the great scholars Yu Yue and Zhang Taiyan, Song had been to Japan and observed the effect of the kana syllabaries. This galvanized him into activity on a number of fronts, one of the most important being reform of the script, while Song did not himself actually create a system for spelling Sinitic languages, his discussion proved fertile and led to a proliferation of schemes for phonetic scripts. The Wade–Giles system was produced by Thomas Wade in 1859, and it was popular and used in English-language publications outside China until 1979. This Sin Wenz or New Writing was much more sophisticated than earlier alphabets. In 1940, several members attended a Border Region Sin Wenz Society convention. Mao Zedong and Zhu De, head of the army, both contributed their calligraphy for the masthead of the Sin Wenz Societys new journal. Outside the CCP, other prominent supporters included Sun Yat-sens son, Sun Fo, Cai Yuanpei, the countrys most prestigious educator, Tao Xingzhi, an educational reformer. Over thirty journals soon appeared written in Sin Wenz, plus large numbers of translations, biographies, some contemporary Chinese literature, and a spectrum of textbooks
Hanyu Pinyin
–
A school slogan asking elementary students to speak
Putonghua is annotated with pinyin, but without tonal marks.
Hanyu Pinyin
–
In
Yiling,
Yichang,
Hubei, text on road signs appears both in Chinese characters and in Hanyu Pinyin
6.
Standard Chinese
–
Its pronunciation is based on the Beijing dialect, its vocabulary on the Mandarin dialects, and its grammar is based on written vernacular Chinese. Like other varieties of Chinese, Standard Chinese is a language with topic-prominent organization. It has more initial consonants but fewer vowels, final consonants, Standard Chinese is an analytic language, though with many compound words. There exist two standardised forms of the language, namely Putonghua in Mainland China and Guoyu in Taiwan, aside from a number of differences in pronunciation and vocabulary, Putonghua is written using simplified Chinese characters, while Guoyu is written using traditional Chinese characters. There are many characters that are identical between the two systems, in English, the governments of China and Hong Kong use Putonghua, Putonghua Chinese, Mandarin Chinese, and Mandarin, while those of Taiwan, Singapore, and Malaysia, use Mandarin. The name Putonghua also has a long, albeit unofficial, history and it was used as early as 1906 in writings by Zhu Wenxiong to differentiate a modern, standard Chinese from classical Chinese and other varieties of Chinese. For some linguists of the early 20th century, the Putonghua, or common tongue/speech, was different from the Guoyu. The former was a prestige variety, while the latter was the legal standard. Based on common understandings of the time, the two were, in fact, different, Guoyu was understood as formal vernacular Chinese, which is close to classical Chinese. By contrast, Putonghua was called the speech of the modern man. The use of the term Putonghua by left-leaning intellectuals such as Qu Qiubai, prior to this, the government used both terms interchangeably. In Taiwan, Guoyu continues to be the term for Standard Chinese. The term Putonghua, on the contrary, implies nothing more than the notion of a lingua franca, Huayu, or language of the Chinese nation, originally simply meant Chinese language, and was used in overseas communities to contrast Chinese with foreign languages. Over time, the desire to standardise the variety of Chinese spoken in these communities led to the adoption of the name Huayu to refer to Mandarin and it also incorporates the notion that Mandarin is usually not the national or common language of the areas in which overseas Chinese live. The term Mandarin is a translation of Guānhuà, which referred to the lingua franca of the late Chinese empire, in English, Mandarin may refer to the standard language, the dialect group as a whole, or to historic forms such as the late Imperial lingua franca. The name Modern Standard Mandarin is sometimes used by linguists who wish to distinguish the current state of the language from other northern. Chinese has long had considerable variation, hence prestige dialects have always existed. Confucius, for example, used yǎyán rather than colloquial regional dialects, rime books, which were written since the Northern and Southern dynasties, may also have reflected one or more systems of standard pronunciation during those times
Standard Chinese
–
A poster outside of high school in
Yangzhou urges people to speak Putonghua
Standard Chinese
–
Zhongguo Guanhua (中国官话/中國官話), or Medii Regni Communis Loquela ("Middle Kingdom's Common Speech"), used on the frontispiece of an early Chinese grammar published by
Étienne Fourmont (with
Arcadio Huang) in 1742
7.
Marco Polo
–
He learned the mercantile trade from his father and uncle, Niccolò and Maffeo, who travelled through Asia and met Kublai Khan. In 1269, they returned to Venice to meet Marco for the first time, the three of them embarked on an epic journey to Asia, returning after 24 years to find Venice at war with Genoa, Marco was imprisoned and dictated his stories to a cellmate. He was released in 1299, became a merchant, married. He died in 1324 and was buried in the church of San Lorenzo in Venice, Marco Polo was not the first European to reach China, but he was the first to leave a detailed chronicle of his experience. This book inspired Christopher Columbus and many other travellers, there is a substantial literature based on Polos writings, he also influenced European cartography, leading to the introduction of the Fra Mauro map. Marco Polo was born in 1254 in Venice Republic and his exact date and place of birth are archivally unknown. Some historians mentioned that he was born on September 15 but that date is not endorsed by mainstream scholarship, Marco Polos birthplace is generally considered Venice, but also varies between Constantinople, and the island of Korčula. There is dispute as to whether the Polo family is of Venetian origin, the first recorded Polo is Venetian Domenico Polo who was mentioned in 971 regarding the prohibition of trade with the Arabs. Later other Polos were also mentioned in the service of the realm, whether they were related with the family of Marco Polo is uncertain, but this could indicate that his ancestors travelled between Venice and Dalmatia. Some of the first indications of where his family originated and were resident come from Venetian documents and manuscripts. Some scholars argued that this account could go along with the note from Il Milione that his father and uncle, Niccolò and Maffeo Polo, the non-Venetian i. e. Sanuto also mentioned a captain from Korčula, Antonio di Polo. Moule cited two early 17th century Venetian manuscripts questi ueneno de dalmatia, Polo questi uene de Dalmatia, scholars etymologically argued that his family name derives from Latin Paulus, the name of a certain bird species, or like Albert tSerstevens considered - from Eastern origin. However, the habitat of the shorebird is non-existent on Korčula, the surname Polo seems related with other widespread Dalmatian surnames. The lack of evidence makes the Korčula theory as a specific birthplace strongly disputed, in 1168, his great-uncle, Marco Polo, borrowed money and commanded a ship in Constantinople. His grandfather, Andrea Polo of the parish of San Felice, had three sons, Maffeo, yet another Marco, and the travellers father Niccolò and this genealogy, described by Ramusio, is not universally accepted as there is no additional evidence to support it. His father, Niccolò Polo, a merchant, traded with the Near East, becoming wealthy, Niccolò and his brother Maffeo set off on a trading voyage before Marcos birth. In 1260, Niccolò and Maffeo, while residing in Constantinople, then the capital of the Latin Empire, foresaw a political change, they liquidated their assets into jewels and moved away. According to The Travels of Marco Polo, they passed through much of Asia, and met with Kublai Khan and their decision to leave Constantinople proved timely
Marco Polo
–
Polo wearing a
Tatar outfit, date of print unknown
Marco Polo
–
Corte del Milion is still called after the nickname of Polo, "Il Milione"
Marco Polo
–
San Lorenzo church in the
sestiere of
Castello (
Venice), where Polo was buried. The photo shows the church as is today, after the 1592 rebuilding.
Marco Polo
–
A
miniature from Il Milione.
8.
Louis XIV
–
Louis XIV, known as Louis the Great or the Sun King, was a monarch of the House of Bourbon who ruled as King of France and Navarre from 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the longest of any monarch of a country in European history. In the age of absolutism in Europe, Louis XIVs France was a leader in the centralization of power. Louis began his rule of France in 1661, after the death of his chief minister. By these means he became one of the most powerful French monarchs, under his rule, the Edict of Nantes, which granted rights to Huguenots, was abolished. The revocation effectively forced Huguenots to emigrate or convert in a wave of dragonnades, which managed to virtually destroy the French Protestant minority. During Louis reign, France was the leading European power, and it fought three wars, the Franco-Dutch War, the War of the League of Augsburg. There were also two lesser conflicts, the War of Devolution and the War of the Reunions, warfare defined Louis XIVs foreign policies, and his personality shaped his approach. Impelled by a mix of commerce, revenge, and pique, in peacetime he concentrated on preparing for the next war. He taught his diplomats their job was to create tactical and strategic advantages for the French military, Louis XIV was born on 5 September 1638 in the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, to Louis XIII and Anne of Austria. He was named Louis Dieudonné and bore the title of French heirs apparent. At the time of his birth, his parents had married for 23 years. His mother had experienced four stillbirths between 1619 and 1631, leading contemporaries thus regarded him as a divine gift and his birth a miracle of God. Sensing imminent death, Louis XIII decided to put his affairs in order in the spring of 1643, in defiance of custom, which would have made Queen Anne the sole Regent of France, the king decreed that a regency council would rule on his sons behalf. His lack of faith in Queen Annes political abilities was his primary rationale and he did, however, make the concession of appointing her head of the council. Louis relationship with his mother was uncommonly affectionate for the time, contemporaries and eyewitnesses claimed that the Queen would spend all her time with Louis. Both were greatly interested in food and theatre, and it is likely that Louis developed these interests through his close relationship with his mother. This long-lasting and loving relationship can be evidenced by excerpts in Louis journal entries, such as, but attachments formed later by shared qualities of the spirit are far more difficult to break than those formed merely by blood
Louis XIV
–
Louis XIV by
Hyacinthe Rigaud (1701)
Louis XIV
–
Louis-Dieudonné,
Dauphin of France, in 1643 by
Claude Deruet
Louis XIV
–
Louis XIV as a child, unknown painter
Louis XIV
–
1655 portrait of Louis, the Victor of the Fronde, portrayed as the god
Jupiter
9.
Cambalu
–
Khanbaliq or Dadu was the capital of the Yuan dynasty, the main center of the Mongol Empire founded by Kublai Khan and in what is now Beijing, also the capital of China today. It was located at the center of modern Beijing, the Secretariat directly administered the Central Region of the Yuan Empire and dictated policies for the other provinces. Kublai and his successors also claimed supremacy over the entire Mongol Empire, the name Khanbaliq comes from the Mongolian and Uyghur words khan and balik, City of the Khan. It was actually in use among the Eastern Turks and Mongols before the fall of Zhongdu and it is traditionally written as Cambaluc in English, after its spelling in Rustichellos retelling of Marco Polos travels. The name Dadu, formerly romanized as Ta-Tu, is the transcription of the Chinese name 大都. The Mongols also called the city Daidu, which was a transliteration directly from the Chinese, in modern Chinese, it is referred to as Yuan Dadu to distinguish it from other cities which have borne similar names. Zhongdu, the Central Capital of the Jurchen Jin dynasty, was located at a site now part of Xicheng District. It was destroyed by Genghis Khan in 1215 when the Jin court began contemplating a move south to a more defensible capital such as Kaifeng. The Imperial Mint established in 1260 and responsible for the printing of chao, in 1264, Kublai Khan visited the Daning Palace on Jade Island in Taiye Lake and was so enchanted with the site that he directed his capital to be constructed around the garden. The chief architect and planner of the capital was Liu Bingzhong and his student Guo Shoujing and the Muslim Ikhtiyar al-Din were also involved. The construction of the walls of the city began in the same year and it was broad in scale, strict in planning and execution, and complete in equipment. A year after the 1271 establishment of the Yuan dynasty, Kublai Khan proclaimed the city his capital under the name Dadu although construction was not fully completed until 1293 and his previous seat at Shangdu became the summer capital. As part of the Great Khans policy of tolerance, Khanbaliq had various houses of worship. It even was the seat of a Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Khanbaliq from 1307 until its 1357 suppression, the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming dynasty sent an army to Khanbaliq in 1368. The last Yuan emperor fled north to Xanadu while the Ming razed the palaces of their capital to the ground, the former capital was renamed Beiping and Shuntian Prefecture was established in the area around the city. The Hongwu Emperor was succeeded by his grandson the Jianwen Emperor. His attempts to rein in the fiefs of his powerful uncles provoked the Jingnan Rebellion and, ultimately, his usurpation by his uncle, yans powerbase lay in Shuntian and he quickly resolved to move his capital north from Yingtian to the ruins at Beiping. He shortened the northern boundaries of the Mongol city and added a new, upon the southern extension of the Taiye Lake, the raising of Wansui Hill over Mongol ruins, and the completion of the Forbidden City to its south, he declared the city his northern capital Beijing
Cambalu
–
Khanbaliq
Cambalu
Cambalu
–
A sculpture of a lion with three cubs from Khanbaliq, discovered beneath the Ming-era city wall and now on display at the Beijing Stone Carving Museum
10.
Beijing
–
Beijing is the capital of the Peoples Republic of China and the worlds third most populous city proper. It is also one of the worlds most populous capital cities, the city, located in northern China, is governed as a direct-controlled municipality under the national government with 16 urban, suburban, and rural districts. Beijing is the second largest Chinese city by population after Shanghai and is the nations political, cultural. It is home to the headquarters of most of Chinas largest state-owned companies, and is a hub for the national highway, expressway, railway. The citys history dates back three millennia, as the last of the Four Great Ancient Capitals of China, Beijing has been the political centre of the country for much of the past eight centuries. Beijing was the largest city in the world by population for much of the second millennium A. D, the city is renowned for its opulent palaces, temples, parks, gardens, tombs, walls and gates. Its art treasures and universities have made it centre of culture, encyclopædia Britannica notes that few cities in the world have served for so long as the political headquarters and cultural centre of an area as immense as China. Siheyuans, the traditional housing style, and hutongs, the narrow alleys between siheyuans, are major tourist attractions and are common in urban Beijing. The city hosted the 2008 Summer Olympics and was chosen to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, many of Beijings 91 universities consistently rank among the best in China, of which Peking University and Tsinghua University are ranked in the top 60 universities in the world. Beijings Zhongguancun area is known as Chinas Silicon Valley and Chinas center of innovation. According to the 2016 InterNations Expat Insider Survey, Beijing ranked first in Asia in the subcategory Personal Finance Index, expats live primarily in urban districts such as Dongcheng and Chaoyang in the east, or in suburban districts such as Shunyi. Over the past 3,000 years, the city of Beijing has had other names. The name Beijing, which means Northern Capital, was applied to the city in 1403 during the Ming Dynasty to distinguish the city from Nanjing, the English spelling is based on the pinyin romanisation of the two characters as they are pronounced in Standard Mandarin. Those dialects preserve the Middle Chinese pronunciation of 京 as kjaeng, the single Chinese character abbreviation for Beijing is 京, which appears on automobile license plates in the city. The official Latin alphabet abbreviation for Beijing is BJ, the earliest traces of human habitation in the Beijing municipality were found in the caves of Dragon Bone Hill near the village of Zhoukoudian in Fangshan District, where Peking Man lived. Homo erectus fossils from the date to 230,000 to 250,000 years ago. Paleolithic Homo sapiens also lived more recently, about 27,000 years ago. Archaeologists have found neolithic settlements throughout the municipality, including in Wangfujing, the first walled city in Beijing was Ji, a city from the 11th to 7th century BC
Beijing
–
Clockwise from top:
Beijing CBD skyline,
Tiananmen,
Temple of Heaven,
National Center for the Performing Arts, and
Beijing National Stadium
Beijing
–
The museum at
Zhoukoudian
Beijing
–
The
Tianning Pagoda, built around 1120.
Beijing
–
Longevity Hill in Beijing where
Kublai Khan wrote his poem.
11.
Matteo Ricci
–
Matteo Ricci, S. J. was an Italian Jesuit priest and one of the founding figures of the Jesuit China missions. His 1602 map of the world in Chinese characters introduced the findings of European exploration to East Asia and he is considered a Servant of God in Roman Catholicism. Ricci arrived at the Portuguese settlement of Macau in 1582 where he began his work in China. Ricci was born October 6,1552, in Macerata, part of the Papal States and he made his classical studies in his native town and studied law at Rome for two years. He entered the Society of Jesus in April 1571 at the Roman College, while there, in addition to philosophy and theology, he also studied mathematics, cosmology, and astronomy under the direction of Father Christopher Clavius. In 1577, he applied for an expedition to the Far East. He sailed from Lisbon, Portugal in March 1578 and arrived in Goa, a Portuguese Colony, Ricci remained there employed in teaching and the ministry until the end of Lent,1582, when he was summoned to Macau to prepare to enter China. Ricci arrived at Macau in the part of August. In August 1582, Ricci arrived at Macau, a Portuguese trading post on the South China Sea. At the time, Christian missionary activity in China was almost completely limited to Macau, paul Jesuit College, and to prepare for the Jesuits mission from Macau into Mainland China. Once in Macau, Ricci studied Chinese language and customs and it was the beginning of a long project that made him one of the first Western scholars to master Chinese script and Classical Chinese. With Ruggieri, he traveled to Guangdongs major cities, Canton, in 1583, Ricci and Ruggieri settled in Zhaoqing, at the invitation of the governor of Zhaoqing, Wang Pan, who had heard of Riccis skill as a mathematician and cartographer. Ricci stayed in Zhaoqing from 1583 to 1589, when he was expelled by a new viceroy and it was in Zhaoqing, in 1584, that Ricci composed the first European-style map of the world in Chinese, now called the Impossible Black Tulip after its rarity. No prints of the 1584 map survive, but six recopied, the manuscript was misplaced in the Jesuit Archives in Rome, rediscovered only in 1934, and published only in 2001. There is now a plaque in Zhaoqing to commemorate Riccis six-year stay there. Expelled from Zhaoqing in 1589, Ricci obtained permission to relocate to Shaoguan in the north of the province, further travels saw Ricci reach Nanjing and Nanchang in 1595. In August 1597, Alessandro Valignano, his superior, appointed him Major Superior of the mission in China, with the rank and powers of a Provincial and he moved to Tongzhou in 1598, and first reached the capital Beijing itself on 7 September 1598. However, because of a Korean/Japanese war at the time, Ricci could not reach the Imperial Palace, after waiting for two months, he left Beijing, first for Nanjing and then Suzhou in Southern Zhili Province
Matteo Ricci
–
Servant of God Matteo Ricci
Matteo Ricci
–
Matteo Ricci's way from Macau to Beijing
Matteo Ricci
–
Left plates 1-3
Matteo Ricci
–
Unattributed, very detailed, two-page colored edition (1604?), copy of the 1602 map with Japanese
katakana transliterations of the phonetic Chinese characters
12.
Cathay
–
Cathay is the Anglicized rendering of Catai and an alternative name for China in English. Originally, Catai was the name applied by Central and Western Asians and Europeans to northern China, the term Cathay came from the name for the Khitans. A form of the name Cathai is attested in a Uyghur Manichaean document circa 1000. The Khitans refer to themselves as Qidan, but in the language of the ancient Uyghurs the final -n or -ń became -y, and this version of the name was then introduced to medieval and early modern Europe via Muslim and Russian sources. The Persian scholar and administrator Nizam al-Mulk mentions Khita and China in his Book on the Administration of the State, the names currency in the Muslim world survived the replacement of the Khitan Liao dynasty with the Jurchen Jin dynasty in the early 12th century. When describing the fall of the Jin Empire to the Mongols, the Mongols themselves, in their Secret History talk of both Khitans and Kara-Khitans. Words related to Khitay are still used in many Turkic and Slavic languages to refer to China, however, its use by Turkic speakers within China, such as the Uyghurs, is considered pejorative by the Chinese authority who had tried to ban it. As European and Arab travelers started reaching the Mongol Empire, they described the Mongol-controlled Northern China as Cathay as well, the name occurs in the writings of Giovanni da Pian del Carpine, William of Rubruck. Rashid-al-Din Hamadani, ibn Battuta, Marco Polo all were referring to Northern China as Cathay, while Southern China, ruled by the Song dynasty, was Mangi, Manzi, Chin, or Sin. The name for South China commonly used on Western medieval maps was Mangi, while Central Asia had long known China under names similar to Cathay, that country was known to the peoples of South-East Asia and India under names similar to China. Meanwhile, in China itself, people referred to their nation state based on the name of the ruling dynasty, e. g. Da Ming Guo, or as the Middle Kingdom. When in the early 16th century the Portuguese reached South-East Asia and it was not immediately clear to the Europeans whether this China is the same country as Cathay known from Marco Polo. Therefore, it would not be uncommon for 16th-century map to apply the label China just to the region already well known to the Europeans. During his first 15 years in China Matteo Ricci formed a strong suspicion that Marco Polos Cathay is simply the Tatar name for the country he was in, people in China had not heard of any place called Cathay. This all made them quite convinced that Cathay is indeed China, china-based Jesuits promptly informed their colleagues in Goa and Europe about their discovery of the Cathay-China identity. This was stated e. g. in a 1602 letter of Riccis comrade Diego de Pantoja and this may also have been the genesis of the Prester John myth. Góis spent almost three years crossing Afghanistan, Badakhshan, Kashgaria, and Kingdom of Cialis with Muslim trade caravans, finally disappear from view, leaving China only in the mouths and minds of men. Riccis and de Gois conclusion was not, however, completely convincing for everybody in Europe yet, samuel Purchas, who in 1625 published an English translation of Pantojas letter and Riccis account, thought that perhaps, Cathay still can be found somewhere north of China
Cathay
–
"Chataio" on
Fra Mauro map (ca. 1450). Note that the south is on top
Cathay
–
On this 1570 map by
Abraham Ortelius, Cataio is located inland of China (referring to today's
Guangdong) and Chequan (
Zhejiang), and borders on "
Thebet " in the southwest and "
Camul " in the west. There is also mysterious
Mangi (between "Cataio" and Xanton (
Shandong)). The objects in "Cataio" are based on Marco Polo's description and include the capital
Cambalu,
Xandu, and a
marble bridge
Cathay
–
Gerardus Mercator 's placing of the "Kingdom of Cathay" (Cathay Reg.) on the Pacific Coast north-east of China remained typical for a number of maps published in the decades to follow
Cathay
–
A typical early 17th-century depiction of "Cataia" as China's northeastern neighbour.
Jodocus Hondius, 1610
13.
John Speed
–
John Speed was an English cartographer and historian. He is known as Englands most famous and well-known Stuart period mapmaker of his time, Speed was born at Farndon, Cheshire and went into the tailoring business of his father, Samuel, later in life. While working in London, Speed was a tailor and member of a corresponding guild and these individuals included Sir Fulke Greville, who subsequently made him an allowance to enable him to devote his whole attention to research. By 1598 he had enough patronage to leave his manual labor job, as a reward for his earlier efforts, Queen Elizabeth granted Speed the use of a room in the Custom House. Speed, was, by point, as tailor turned scholar who had a highly-developed pictorial sense. In 1575, Speed married a woman named Susanna Draper in London, regardless, there is no doubt that the Speed family was relatively well-off. At age 77 or 78, in August 1629, Speed died and he was buried alongside his wife in Londons St Giles-without-Cripplegate church on Fore Street within the Barbican Estate. Later on, a memorial to John Speed was also erected behind the altar of the church, according to the churchs website, one of the few memorials that survived the bombing of London during The Blitz of 1940–1941. The website also notes that he cast for the niche in which the bust is placed was provided by the Merchant Taylors Company and his memorial brass has ended up on display in the Burrell Collection near Glasgow. It was with the encouragement of William Camden that Speed began his Historie of Great Britaine, the atlas was not above projections of his political opinions Speed represented King James I as one who unified the Kingdoms of the British isles. Most, but not all, of the county maps have town plans on them,54 His maps of English and Welsh counties, often with bordered with custumed figures ranging from nobility to country folk, are often found framed in homes throughout the United Kingdom. He also drew maps of the Channel Islands, Poland, and the Americas, on the year of his death, yet another collection of maps of Great Britain he had drawn the year before were published. As these writings indicate, he possibly saw Wales as English, since his maps were used in many high circles, Speeds legacy has been long-reaching. a scholar. a distinguished writer on history. He was also called a celebrated chronologer and histographer, cartographer, antique Maps, with information about John Speed John Speed Wikisource Stanford Libraries collection of John Speed and John Ogilby, 15-16th Century Cartographers John Speeds Find A Grave entry
John Speed
–
Memorial to John Speed,
St Giles-without-Cripplegate
John Speed
–
Speed's 1610 map of
Wales
John Speed
–
An example of an insert from Speeds 1610 map of Wales
John Speed
–
The
Countie Pallatine of Lancaster described and divided into hundreds, 1610
14.
Khan (title)
–
Khan is originally a title for a sovereign or a military ruler, widely used by Turkic and later medieval nomadic Mongolian tribes living to the north of China. Khan also occurs as a title in the Xianbei confederation for their chief between 283 and 289, the Rourans were the first people who used the titles khagan and khan for their emperors. Subsequently the Ashina adopted the title and brought it to the rest of Asia, in the middle of the sixth century the Iranians knew of a Kagan – King of the Turks. Khan now has many equivalent meanings such as commander, leader, as of 2015 khans exist in South Asia, Middle East, Central Asia, Eastern Europe and Turkey. The female alternatives are Khatun, Khatoon and Khanum and these titles or names are sometimes written as Han, Kan, Hakan, Hanum, or Hatun and as xan, xanım. Khagan is rendered as Khan of Khans and it was the title of Chinese Emperor Emperor Taizong of Tang, and also the title of Genghis Khan and of the persons selected to rule the Mongol Empire. For instance Möngke Khan and Ogedei Khan would be Khagans but not Chagatai Khan, some managed to establish principalities of some importance for a while, as their military might repeatedly proved a serious threat to such empires as China and kingdoms in Central Asia. One of the earliest notable examples of such principalities in Europe was Danube Bulgaria, Khan was the official title of the ruler until 864 AD, when Kniaz Boris adopted the Eastern Orthodox faith. The title Khan became unprecedently prominent when the Mongol Temüjin created the Mongol empire, the greatest land empire the world has ever seen and his title was khagan, or Khan of Khans, but has often been abbreviated to Khan or described as Great Khan. The great leader was regarded as a khan in the middle east, ming Dynasty Chinese Emperors also used the term Xan to denote brave warriors and rulers. The title Khan was used to designate the greatest rulers of the Jurchens, while most Afghan principalities were styled emirate, there was a khanate of ethnic Uzbeks in Badakhshan since 1697. For example, in present Armenia and nearby territories to the left and right, diverse khanates existed in Dagestan, Azerbaijan, including Baku, Ganja, Jawad, Quba, Salyan, Shakki and Shirvan=Shamakha, Talysh, Nakhichevan and Karabakh. The most important of these states were, Khanate of Kazan, sibir Khanate Astrakhan Khanate Crimean Khanate. The ruling descendants of the branch of Genghis Khans dynasty are referred to as the Great Khans. The title Khan of Khans was among numerous titles used by the Sultans of the Ottoman empire as well as the rulers of the Golden Horde and its descendant states. The title Khan was also used in the Seljuk Turk dynasties of the near-east to designate a head of multiple tribes, clans or nations, jurchen and Manchu rulers also used the title Khan, for example, Nurhaci was called Genggiyen Han. Rulers of the Göktürks, Avars and Khazars used the higher title Kaghan, see the main article for more details. Khan-i-Khanan was a given to the commander-in-chief of the army of the Mughals
Khan (title)
–
Eurasia on the eve of the Mongol invasions, c. AD 1200.
Khan (title)
–
Navaanneren, Minister of the Interior, who along with the 23rd Tushiyetu Khan Dorjsurenkhoroljav (1908-1937) was the last Khan in Mongolia. He was executed during the
great purges of 1937.
Khan (title)
–
Mongol Empire's largest extent outlined in red; the
Timurid Empire is shaded
Khan (title)
–
Two Khans in Turkoman Tribal Costume, One of 274 Vintage Photographs.
Brooklyn Museum.
15.
Khanbaliq
–
Khanbaliq or Dadu was the capital of the Yuan dynasty, the main center of the Mongol Empire founded by Kublai Khan and in what is now Beijing, also the capital of China today. It was located at the center of modern Beijing, the Secretariat directly administered the Central Region of the Yuan Empire and dictated policies for the other provinces. Kublai and his successors also claimed supremacy over the entire Mongol Empire, the name Khanbaliq comes from the Mongolian and Uyghur words khan and balik, City of the Khan. It was actually in use among the Eastern Turks and Mongols before the fall of Zhongdu and it is traditionally written as Cambaluc in English, after its spelling in Rustichellos retelling of Marco Polos travels. The name Dadu, formerly romanized as Ta-Tu, is the transcription of the Chinese name 大都. The Mongols also called the city Daidu, which was a transliteration directly from the Chinese, in modern Chinese, it is referred to as Yuan Dadu to distinguish it from other cities which have borne similar names. Zhongdu, the Central Capital of the Jurchen Jin dynasty, was located at a site now part of Xicheng District. It was destroyed by Genghis Khan in 1215 when the Jin court began contemplating a move south to a more defensible capital such as Kaifeng. The Imperial Mint established in 1260 and responsible for the printing of chao, in 1264, Kublai Khan visited the Daning Palace on Jade Island in Taiye Lake and was so enchanted with the site that he directed his capital to be constructed around the garden. The chief architect and planner of the capital was Liu Bingzhong and his student Guo Shoujing and the Muslim Ikhtiyar al-Din were also involved. The construction of the walls of the city began in the same year and it was broad in scale, strict in planning and execution, and complete in equipment. A year after the 1271 establishment of the Yuan dynasty, Kublai Khan proclaimed the city his capital under the name Dadu although construction was not fully completed until 1293 and his previous seat at Shangdu became the summer capital. As part of the Great Khans policy of tolerance, Khanbaliq had various houses of worship. It even was the seat of a Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Khanbaliq from 1307 until its 1357 suppression, the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming dynasty sent an army to Khanbaliq in 1368. The last Yuan emperor fled north to Xanadu while the Ming razed the palaces of their capital to the ground, the former capital was renamed Beiping and Shuntian Prefecture was established in the area around the city. The Hongwu Emperor was succeeded by his grandson the Jianwen Emperor. His attempts to rein in the fiefs of his powerful uncles provoked the Jingnan Rebellion and, ultimately, his usurpation by his uncle, yans powerbase lay in Shuntian and he quickly resolved to move his capital north from Yingtian to the ruins at Beiping. He shortened the northern boundaries of the Mongol city and added a new, upon the southern extension of the Taiye Lake, the raising of Wansui Hill over Mongol ruins, and the completion of the Forbidden City to its south, he declared the city his northern capital Beijing
Khanbaliq
–
Khanbaliq
Khanbaliq
Khanbaliq
–
A sculpture of a lion with three cubs from Khanbaliq, discovered beneath the Ming-era city wall and now on display at the Beijing Stone Carving Museum
16.
Mongolian language
–
The Mongolian language is the official language of Mongolia and largest-known member of the Mongolic language family. The number of speakers across all its dialects may be 10 million, including the vast majority of the residents of Mongolia and many of the Mongolian residents of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region. In Mongolia, the Khalkha dialect, written in Cyrillic, is predominant, while in Inner Mongolia, some classify several other Mongolic languages like Buryat and Oirat as dialects of Mongolian, but this classification is not in line with the current international standard. Mongolian has vowel harmony and a complex structure for a Mongolic language that allows clusters of up to three consonants syllable-finally. It is an agglutinative language that relies on suffix chains in the verbal and nominal domains. While there is a word order, subject–object–predicate, ordering among noun phrases is relatively free. Verbs are marked for voice, aspect, tense, and epistemic modality/evidentiality, in sentence linking, a special role is played by converbs. Modern Mongolian evolved from Middle Mongol, the language spoken in the Mongol Empire of the 13th and 14th centuries, in the transition, a major shift in the vowel-harmony paradigm occurred, long vowels developed, the case system changed slightly, and the verbal system was restructured. Mongolian is distantly related to the Khitan language and it belongs to the Northern Asian linguistic area, including the Turkic, Mongolic, Tungusic, Korean and Japonic languages. These languages have been grouped under the still-debated Altaic language family, Mongolian literature is well attested in written form from the 13th century but has earlier Mongolic precursors in the literature of the Khitan and other Xianbei peoples. The use of Mongolian in Inner Mongolia, has witnessed periods of decline, the multilingual situation in Inner Mongolia does not appear to obstruct efforts by ethnic Mongols to preserve their language. The children of inter-ethnic Mongol-Chinese marriages also claim to be and are registered as ethnic Mongols, Mongolian belongs to the Mongolic languages. Such data might account for the development of the Mongolian dialect continuum. The status of certain varieties in the Mongolic group—whether they are distinct from Mongolian or just dialects of it—is disputed. There are at least three varieties, Oirat and Buryat, both of which are spoken in Russia, Mongolia, and China, and Ordos, spoken around Inner Mongolias Ordos City. There is no disagreement that the Khalkha dialect of the Mongolian state is Mongolian, beyond this one point, however, agreement ends. On the other hand, Luvsanvandan proposed a much broader Mongolian language consisting of a Central dialect, an Eastern dialect, a Western dialect, some Western scholars propose that the relatively well researched Ordos variety is an independent language due to its conservative syllable structure and phoneme inventory. On the other hand, the split between the past tense verbal suffixes -sŋ in the Central varieties vs. -dʒɛː in the Eastern varieties is usually seen as a stochastic difference
Mongolian language
–
Mongolian script and
Mongolian Cyrillic on
Sukhbaatar's statue in
Ulan Bator.
Mongolian language
–
Geographic distribution of Mongolic peoples (red)
Mongolian language
–
Nova N 176 found in Kyrgyzstan. The manuscript (dating to the 12th century
Western Liao) is written in the Mongolic
Khitan language using cursive
Khitan large script. It has 127 leaves and 15,000 characters.
Mongolian language
–
Edict of
Yesün Temür Khan, Emperor Taiding of Yuan (1328). Only the
'Phags-pa script retains the complete
Middle Mongol vowel system.
17.
Capital city
–
A capital city is the municipality exercising primary status in a country, state, province, or other region, usually as its seat of government. A capital is typically a city that encompasses the offices and meeting places of its respective government. In some jurisdictions, including countries, the different branches of government are located in different settlements. In some cases, a distinction is made between the capital and the seat of government, which is in another place. The word capital derives from the Latin caput, meaning head, in several English-speaking states, the terms county town, county seat, and borough seat are also used in lower subdivisions. In unitary states, subnational capitals are known as administrative centres. The capital is often, but not necessarily, the largest city of its constituent, historically, the major economic centre of a state or region often becomes the focal point of political power, and becomes a capital through conquest or federation. Examples are Ancient Babylon, Abbasid Baghdad, Ancient Athens, Rome, Constantinople, Changan, Ancient Cusco, Madrid, Paris, London, Moscow, Beijing, Tokyo, Vienna, and Berlin. Some of these cities are or were also religious centres, e. g. Constantinople, Rome, Jerusalem, Ancient Babylon, Moscow, Belgrade, Paris, and Peking. A capital city that is also the economic, cultural. The convergence of political and economic or cultural power is by no means universal, traditional capitals may be economically eclipsed by provincial rivals, e. g. Nanking by Shanghai, Quebec City by Montreal, and numerous US state capitals. The decline of a dynasty or culture could also mean the extinction of its city, as occurred at Babylon. Although many capitals are defined by constitution or legislation, many long-time capitals have no legal designation as such, for example Bern, Edinburgh, Lisbon, London, Paris, are located in or near them. In Canada, there is a capital, while the ten provinces. The states of such countries as Mexico, Brazil, and Australia all have capital cities, for example, the six state capitals of Australia are Adelaide, Brisbane, Hobart, Melbourne, Perth, and Sydney. In Australia, the capital cities is regularly used, to refer to the aforementioned state capitals plus the federal capital Canberra and Darwin. Abu Dhabi is the city of the Emirate of Abu Dhabi. In unitary states which consist of multiple constituent countries, such as the United Kingdom or the Kingdom of Denmark, the national capitals of Germany and Russia, the Stadtstaat of Berlin and the Federal City of Moscow, are also constituent states of both countries in their own right
Capital city
–
Parliament Hill, the national legislative buildings, in
Ottawa, the capital of
Canada.
Capital city
–
The
Roman Forum was surrounded by many government buildings as the capital of
Ancient Rome.
Capital city
–
The
Western Wall is one of the greatest findings of the Jewish history in
Jerusalem.
Capital city
–
Cornwall Council headquarters in the
county town of
Truro.
18.
Kublai Khan
–
Kublai Khan, born Kublai and also known by the temple name Shizu, was the fifth Khagan of the Mongol Empire, reigning from 1260 to 1294. He also founded the Yuan dynasty in China as a conquest dynasty in 1271, Kublai was the fourth son of Tolui and a grandson of Genghis Khan. He succeeded his older brother Möngke as Khagan in 1260, but had to defeat his younger brother Ariq Böke in the Toluid Civil War lasting until 1264 and this episode marked the beginning of disunity in the empire. Kublais real power was limited to China and Mongolia, though as Khagan he still had influence in the Ilkhanate and, to a lesser degree. In 1271, Kublai established the Yuan dynasty, which ruled over present-day Mongolia, China, Korea, and some adjacent areas, by 1279, the Mongol conquest of the Song dynasty was completed and Kublai became the first non-native emperor to conquer all of China. Kublai Khan was the son of Tolui, and his second son with Sorghaghtani Beki. As his grandfather Genghis Khan advised, Sorghaghtani chose a Buddhist Tangut woman as her sons nurse, on his way home after the Mongol conquest of Khwarezmia, Genghis Khan performed a ceremony on his grandsons Möngke and Kublai after their first hunt in 1224 near the Ili River. Kublai was nine years old and with his eldest brother killed a rabbit and his grandfather smeared fat from killed animals onto Kublais middle finger in accordance with a Mongol tradition. After the Mongol conquest of the Jin dynasty, in 1236, Ögedei gave Hebei to the family of Tolui, Kublai received an estate of his own, which included 10,000 households. Because he was inexperienced, Kublai allowed local officials free rein, corruption amongst his officials and aggressive taxation caused large numbers of Chinese peasants to flee, which led to a decline in tax revenues. Kublai quickly came to his appanage in Hebei and ordered reforms, Sorghaghtani sent new officials to help him and tax laws were revised. Thanks to those efforts, many of the people who fled returned, the most prominent, and arguably most influential, component of Kublai Khans early life was his study and strong attraction to contemporary Chinese culture. Kublai invited Haiyun, the leading Buddhist monk in North China, when he met Haiyun in Karakorum in 1242, Kublai asked him about the philosophy of Buddhism. Haiyun named Kublais son, who was born in 1243, Zhenjin, Haiyun also introduced Kublai to the formerly Daoist and now Buddhist monk, Liu Bingzhong. Liu was a painter, calligrapher, poet, and mathematician, Kublai soon added the Shanxi scholar Zhao Bi to his entourage. Kublai employed people of other nationalities as well, for he was keen to balance local and imperial interests, Mongol, in 1251, Kublais eldest brother Möngke became Khan of the Mongol Empire, and Khwarizmian Mahmud Yalavach and Kublai were sent to China. Kublai received the viceroyalty over North China and moved his ordo to central Inner Mongolia, during his years as viceroy, Kublai managed his territory well, boosted the agricultural output of Henan, and increased social welfare spendings after receiving Xian. These acts received great acclaim from the Chinese warlords and were essential to the building of the Yuan Dynasty, Möngke dismissed Mahmud Yalavach, which met with resistance from Chinese Confucian-trained officials
Kublai Khan
–
Portrait of Kublai Khan during the Yuan era.
Kublai Khan
–
Portrait of young Kublai by
Anige, a Nepali artist in Kublai's court
Kublai Khan
–
Kublai Khan was chosen by his many supporters to become the next Great Khan at the Grand
Kurultai in the year 1260. (a
Mughal painting)
Kublai Khan
–
Painting of Kublai Khan on a hunting expedition, by Chinese court artist Liu Guandao, c. 1280.
19.
Yuan dynasty
–
The Yuan dynasty, officially the Great Yuan, was the empire or ruling dynasty of China established by Kublai Khan, leader of the Mongolian Borjigin clan. His realm was, by point, isolated from the other khanates and controlled most of present-day China and its surrounding areas. Some of the Mongolian Emperors of the Yuan mastered the Chinese language, while others used their native language. The Yuan dynasty is considered both a successor to the Mongol Empire and an imperial Chinese dynasty and it was the khanate ruled by the successors of Möngke Khan after the division of the Mongol Empire. In official Chinese histories, the Yuan dynasty bore the Mandate of Heaven, following the Song dynasty, the dynasty was established by Kublai Khan, yet he placed his grandfather Genghis Khan on the imperial records as the official founder of the dynasty as Taizu. In addition to Emperor of China, Kublai Khan also claimed the title of Great Khan, supreme over the other khanates, the Chagatai, the Golden Horde. As such, the Yuan was also referred to as the Empire of the Great Khan. However, while the claim of supremacy by the Yuan emperors was at times recognized by the khans, their subservience was nominal. In 1271, Kublai Khan imposed the name Great Yuan, establishing the Yuan dynasty, dà Yuán is from the clause 大哉乾元 in the Commentaries on the Classic of Changes section regarding Qián. The counterpart in Mongolian language was Dai Ön Ulus, also rendered as Ikh Yuan Üls or Yekhe Yuan Ulus, in Mongolian, Dai Ön is often used in conjunction with the Yeke Mongghul Ulus, resulting in Dai Ön Yeke Mongghul Ulus, meaning Great Mongol State. Nevertheless, both terms can refer to the khanate within the Mongol Empire directly ruled by Great Khans before the actual establishment of the Yuan dynasty by Kublai Khan in 1271. Genghis Khan united the Mongol and Turkic tribes of the steppes and he and his successors expanded the Mongol empire across Asia. Under the reign of Genghis third son, Ögedei Khan, the Mongols destroyed the weakened Jin dynasty in 1234, Ögedei offered his nephew Kublai a position in Xingzhou, Hebei. Kublai was unable to read Chinese but had several Han Chinese teachers attached to him since his early years by his mother Sorghaghtani and he sought the counsel of Chinese Buddhist and Confucian advisers. Möngke Khan succeeded Ögedeis son, Güyük, as Great Khan in 1251 and he granted his brother Kublai control over Mongol held territories in China. Kublai built schools for Confucian scholars, issued paper money, revived Chinese rituals and he adopted as his capital city Kaiping in Inner Mongolia, later renamed Shangdu. Many Han Chinese and Khitan defected to the Mongols to fight against the Jin, two Han Chinese leaders, Shi Tianze, Liu Heima, and the Khitan Xiao Zhala defected and commanded the 3 Tumens in the Mongol army. Liu Heima and Shi Tianze served Ogödei Khan, Liu Heima and Shi Tianxiang led armies against Western Xia for the Mongols
Yuan dynasty
–
History of China
Yuan dynasty
–
Yuan dynasty circa 1294
Yuan dynasty
–
Kublai Khan, founder of the Yuan dynasty
Yuan dynasty
–
Painting of a 14th-century Yuan dynasty
junk
20.
History of Beijing
–
The city of Beijing has a long and rich history that dates back over 3,000 years. Prior to the unification of China by the First Emperor in 221 BC, Beijing had been for centuries the capital of the ancient states of Ji, during the first millennia of imperial rule, Beijing was a provincial city in northern China. When Kublai Khan made Dadu the capital of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty, Paleolithic homo sapiens also lived in the caves from about 27,000 to 10,000 years ago. In 1996, over 2,000 Stone Age tools and bone fragments were discovered at a site at Wangfujing in the heart of downtown Beijing in Dongcheng District. The artifacts date to 24,000 to 25,000 years ago and are preserved in the Wangfujing Paleolithic Museum in the level of the New Oriental Plaza mall. Archaeologists have discovered over 40 neolithic settlements and burial sites throughout the municipality, the most notable include Zhuannian of Huairou District, Donghulin of Mentougou District, Shangzhai and Beiniantou of Pinggu District, Zhenjiangying of Fangshan, and Xueshan of Changping District. These sites indicate that farming was widespread in the area 6,000 to 7,000 years ago, painted pottery and carved jade of the Shangzhai and Xueshan Cultures resemble those of the Hongshan Culture further to the north. The earliest events of Beijings history are shrouded in legend and myth and this victory opened North China to settlement by the descendants of the Yan and Yellow Emperors. The Yellow Emperor is said to have founded the settlement of Youling in or near Zhuolu, the sage-king Yao founded a town called Youdu in the Hebei-Beijing region about 4,000 years ago. You or Youzhou later became one of the names for Beijing. Yuzishan, in Shandongzhuang Village of Pinggu County, in the fringe of Beijing Municipality, is one of several places in China claiming to host the Yellow Emperors Tomb. Yuzishans association with Yellow Emperor dates back at least 1,300 years when Tang poets Chen Ziang, the first event in Beijings history with archaeological support dates to the 11th century BC when the Zhou dynasty absorbed the Shang dynasty. According to Confucius, King Wu of Zhou was so eager to establish his legitimacy that before dismounting his chariot and he then named his kinsman, Ji Shi, Duke Shao of Zhou, as the vassal of Yan. Ji Shi was preoccupied with other matters and dispatched his eldest son, Ji Ke, Ji Ke, is considered the founder of the Yan State. Bronzeware inscriptions have confirmed these events described in Sima Qians history and it is believed that the seat of Ji, called the City of Ji or Jicheng, was located in the southwestern part of present-day urban Beijing, just south of Guanganmen in Xicheng and Fengtai Districts. Several historical accounts mention a Hill of Ji northwest of the city, South and west of Guang’anmen, roof tiles used for palace construction and dense concentrations of wells lined with ceramic ring tiles have been discovered. The father was thrilled and awarded Jin cowry shells to pay for the creation of an honorific ding to remember the event, the inscription thus confirms the appointment of King Zhous kin to Yan and the location of Yans capital. Both Yan and Ji were situated along an important north-south trade route along the flank of the Taihang Mountains from the Central Plain to the northern steppes
History of Beijing
–
UNESCO World Heritage Site of Beijing
History of Beijing
History of Beijing
–
For several centuries before the unification of China in 221 BC, Beijing was the capital of
the State of Yan. Bronze Yan helmet (above), sword-shaped Yan coins (right), and the Gefujia yun (far right), all from the
Capital Museum.
History of Beijing
21.
Venice
–
Venice is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto region. It is situated across a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and these are located in the shallow Venetian Lagoon, an enclosed bay that lies between the mouths of the Po and the Piave Rivers. Parts of Venice are renowned for the beauty of their settings, their architecture, the lagoon and a part of the city are listed as a World Heritage Site. In 2014,264,579 people resided in Comune di Venezia, together with Padua and Treviso, the city is included in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area, with a total population of 2.6 million. PATREVE is a metropolitan area without any degree of autonomy. The name is derived from the ancient Veneti people who inhabited the region by the 10th century BC, the city was historically the capital of the Republic of Venice. Venice has been known as the La Dominante, Serenissima, Queen of the Adriatic, City of Water, City of Masks, City of Bridges, The Floating City, and City of Canals. The City State of Venice is considered to have been the first real international financial center which gradually emerged from the 9th century to its peak in the 14th century and this made Venice a wealthy city throughout most of its history. It is also known for its several important artistic movements, especially the Renaissance period, Venice has played an important role in the history of symphonic and operatic music, and it is the birthplace of Antonio Vivaldi. Venice has been ranked the most beautiful city in the world as of 2016, the name Venetia, however, derives from the Roman name for the people known as the Veneti, and called by the Greeks Eneti. The meaning of the word is uncertain, although there are other Indo-European tribes with similar-sounding names, such as the Celtic Veneti, Baltic Veneti, and the Slavic Wends. Linguists suggest that the name is based on an Indo-European root *wen, so that *wenetoi would mean beloved, lovable, a connection with the Latin word venetus, meaning the color sea-blue, is also possible. The alternative obsolete form is Vinegia, some late Roman sources reveal the existence of fishermen on the islands in the original marshy lagoons. They were referred to as incolae lacunae, the traditional founding is identified with the dedication of the first church, that of San Giacomo on the islet of Rialto — said to have taken place at the stroke of noon on 25 March 421. Beginning as early as AD166 to 168, the Quadi and Marcomanni destroyed the center in the area. The Roman defences were again overthrown in the early 5th century by the Visigoths and, some 50 years later, New ports were built, including those at Malamocco and Torcello in the Venetian lagoon. The tribuni maiores, the earliest central standing governing committee of the islands in the Lagoon, the traditional first doge of Venice, Paolo Lucio Anafesto, was actually Exarch Paul, and his successor, Marcello Tegalliano, was Pauls magister militum. In 726 the soldiers and citizens of the Exarchate rose in a rebellion over the controversy at the urging of Pope Gregory II
Venice
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A collage of Venice: at the top left is the
Piazza San Marco, followed by a view of the city, then the
Grand Canal, and (smaller) the interior of
La Fenice and, finally, the Island of San Giorgio Maggiore
Venice
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UNESCO World Heritage Site
Venice
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Photography of Venice at dusk
Venice
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The Grand Canal seen from the bridge at
Ponte di Rialto
22.
Hongwu Emperor
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The Hongwu Emperor, personal name Zhu Yuanzhang, was the founder and first emperor of Chinas Ming dynasty. Following his seizure of the Yuan capital, Khanbaliq, Zhu claimed the Mandate of Heaven, trusting only in his family, he made his many sons powerful feudal princes along the northern marches and the Yangtze valley. Most of the sites related to the Hongwu Emperor are located in Nanjing. Zhu was a born into a poor peasant tenant farmer family in Zhongli Village in the Huai River plain. His father was Zhu Shizhen and his mother was Chen Erniang and he had seven older siblings, several of whom were given away by his parents, as they did not have enough food to support the family. When he was 16, severe drought ruined the harvest where his family lived, subsequently, famine killed his entire family, except one of his brothers. He then buried them by wrapping them in white clothes, destitute, Zhu accepted a suggestion to take up a pledge made by his brother and became a novice monk at the Huangjue Temple, a local Buddhist monastery. He did not remain there for long, as the monastery ran short of funds, for the next few years, Zhu led the life of a wandering beggar and personally experienced and saw the hardships of the common people. After about three years, he returned to the monastery and stayed there until he was around 24 years old and he learned to read and write during the time he spent with the Buddhist monks. The monastery where Zhu lived was eventually destroyed by an army that was suppressing a local rebellion, in 1352, Zhu joined one of the many insurgent forces that had risen in rebellion against the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. He rose rapidly through the ranks and became a commander, in 1356, Zhu, and his army conquered Nanjing, which became his base of operations, and the capital of the Ming dynasty during his reign. Zhus government in Nanjing became famous for good governance, and the city attracted vast numbers of people fleeing from other and it is estimated that Nanjings population increased by 10 times over the next 10 years. In the meantime, the Yuan government had weakened by internal factions fighting for control. By 1358, central and southern China had fallen into the hands of different rebel groups, during that time the Red Turbans also split up. Zhu became the leader of a faction, while the larger faction, under Chen Youliang. Zhu was able to attract many talents into his service, one of them was Zhu Sheng, who advised him, Build high walls, stock up rations, and dont be too quick to call yourself a king. Another, Jiao Yu, was an officer, who later compiled a military treatise outlining the various types of gunpowder weapons. Another one, Liu Bowen, became one of Zhus key advisors, starting from 1360, Zhu, and Chen Youliang fought a protracted war for supremacy over the former territories controlled by the Red Turbans
Hongwu Emperor
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Hongwu Emperor
Hongwu Emperor
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Chang Yuchun was a general under the Hongwu Emperor. He led a military campaign north and conquered the
Yuan dynasty 's capital,
Khanbaliq.
Hongwu Emperor
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The
Jinjue Mosque in Nanjing was constructed by the decree of the Hongwu Emperor.
Hongwu Emperor
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A stele carried by a
giant stone tortoise at the
Hongwu Emperor's Mausoleum
23.
Kubla Khan
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Kubla Khan, or, A Vision in a Dream, A Fragment /ˌkʊblə ˈkɑːn/ is a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, completed in 1797 and published in 1816. Upon waking, he set about writing lines of poetry came to him from the dream until he was interrupted by a person from Porlock. The poem could not be completed according to its original 200–300 line plan as the interruption caused him to forget the lines and he left it unpublished and kept it for private readings for his friends until 1816 when, at the prompting of Lord Byron, it was published. Some of Coleridges contemporaries denounced the poem and questioned his story of its origin and it was not until years later that critics began to openly admire the poem. Most modern critics now view Kubla Khan as one of Coleridges three great poems, along with The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel. The poem is considered one of the most famous examples of Romanticism in English poetry, a copy of the manuscript is a permanent exhibit at the British Library in London. Some time between 9 and 14 October 1797, when Coleridge says he had completed the tragedy, he left Stowey for Lynton. On his return, he sick and rested at Ash Farm, located at Culbone Church. On awakening he appeared to himself to have a distinct recollection of the whole, and taking his pen, ink, and paper, instantly and eagerly wrote down the lines that are here preserved. Without the after restoration of the latter, Then all the charm Is broken—all that phantom-world so fair Vanishes, who scarcely darst lift up thine eyes-- The stream will soon renew its smoothness, soon The visions will return. And lo. he stays, And soon the fragments dim of lovely forms Come trembling back, unite, yet from the still surviving recollections in his mind, the Author has frequently purposed to finish for himself what had been originally, as it were, given to him. But the to-morrow is yet to come, as a contrast to this vision, I have annexed a fragment of a very different character, describing with equal fidelity the dream of pain and disease. The book contained a description of Xanadu, the summer capital of the Mongol ruler Kublai Khan. This quotation was based upon the writings of the Venetian explorer Marco Polo who is believed to have visited Xanadu in about 1275. Marco Polo also mentioned a large palace made of gilded and lacquered cane or bamboo which could be taken apart quickly. He described it this way, Moreover at a spot in the Park where there is a charming wood he has another Palace built of cane and it is gilt all over, and most elaborately finished inside. The roof, like the rest, is formed of canes, covered with a varnish so strong and these canes are a good 3 palms in girth, and from 10 to 15 paces in length. In short, the whole Palace is built of these canes, the construction of the Palace is so devised that it can be taken down and put up again with great celerity, and it can all be taken to pieces and removed whithersoever the Emperor may command
Kubla Khan
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Title page of "Kubla Khan" (1816)
Kubla Khan
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Coleridge, 1814
Kubla Khan
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Xanadu (here called Ciandu, as
Marco Polo spelled it) on the French map of Asia made by
Sanson d'Abbeville, geographer of King
Louis XIV, dated 1650. It was northeast of
Cambalu, or modern-day Beijing.
Kubla Khan
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The Crewe Manuscript, handwritten by Coleridge himself some time before the poem was published in 1816
24.
Romanticism
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Romanticism was characterized by its emphasis on emotion and individualism as well as glorification of all the past and nature, preferring the medieval rather than the classical. It was embodied most strongly in the arts, music, and literature, but had a major impact on historiography, education. It elevated folk art and ancient custom to something noble, Romanticism assigned a high value to the achievements of heroic individualists and artists, whose examples, it maintained, would raise the quality of society. It also promoted the individual imagination as a critical authority allowed of freedom from classical notions of form in art, there was a strong recourse to historical and natural inevitability, a Zeitgeist, in the representation of its ideas. In the second half of the 19th century, Realism was offered as a polar opposite to Romanticism, the decline of Romanticism during this time was associated with multiple processes, including social and political changes and the spread of nationalism. Defining the nature of Romanticism may be approached from the point of the primary importance of the free expression of the feelings of the artist. The importance the Romantics placed on emotion is summed up in the remark of the German painter Caspar David Friedrich that the feeling is his law. Samuel Taylor Coleridge and others believed there were laws that the imagination—at least of a good creative artist—would unconsciously follow through artistic inspiration if left alone. As well as rules, the influence of models from other works was considered to impede the creators own imagination, so that originality was essential. The concept of the genius, or artist who was able to produce his own work through this process of creation from nothingness, is key to Romanticism. This idea is called romantic originality. Not essential to Romanticism, but so widespread as to be normative, was a strong belief, however, this is particularly in the effect of nature upon the artist when he is surrounded by it, preferably alone. Romantic art addressed its audiences with what was intended to be felt as the voice of the artist. So, in literature, much of romantic poetry invited the reader to identify the protagonists with the poets themselves. In both French and German the closeness of the adjective to roman, meaning the new literary form of the novel, had some effect on the sense of the word in those languages. It is only from the 1820s that Romanticism certainly knew itself by its name, the period typically called Romantic varies greatly between different countries and different artistic media or areas of thought. Margaret Drabble described it in literature as taking place roughly between 1770 and 1848, and few dates much earlier than 1770 will be found. In English literature, M. H. Abrams placed it between 1789, or 1798, this latter a very typical view, and about 1830, however, in most fields the Romantic Period is said to be over by about 1850, or earlier
Romanticism
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Caspar David Friedrich,
Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, 1818
Romanticism
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Eugène Delacroix,
Death of Sardanapalus, 1827, taking its
Orientalist subject from a play by
Lord Byron
Romanticism
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Philipp Otto Runge, The Morning, 1808
Romanticism
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William Blake,
The Little Girl Found, from
Songs of Innocence and Experience, 1794
25.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He wrote the poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan and his critical work, especially on William Shakespeare, was highly influential, and he helped introduce German idealist philosophy to English-speaking culture. Coleridge coined many words and phrases, including suspension of disbelief. He was an influence on Ralph Waldo Emerson and American transcendentalism. Throughout his adult life Coleridge had crippling bouts of anxiety and depression, it has been speculated that he had bipolar disorder and he was physically unhealthy, which may have stemmed from a bout of rheumatic fever and other childhood illnesses. He was treated for these conditions with laudanum, which fostered a lifelong opium addiction, Coleridge was born on 21 October 1772 in the town of Ottery St Mary in Devon, England. He had previously been Master of Hugh Squiers School in South Molton, Devon, John Coleridge had three children by his first wife. Samuel was the youngest of ten by the Reverend Mr. Coleridges second wife, Anne Bowden, probably the daughter of John Bowden, Mayor of South Molton, Devon, Coleridge suggests that he took no pleasure in boyish sports but instead read incessantly and played by himself. At that school Coleridge became friends with Charles Lamb, a schoolmate, in fancy I can almost hear him now, exclaiming Harp. Pen and ink, boy, you mean, oh aye. the cloister-pump, I suppose. Be this as it may, there was one custom of our masters and he would often permit our theme exercises. To accumulate, till each lad had four or five to be looked over, throughout his life, Coleridge idealised his father as pious and innocent, while his relationship with his mother was more problematic. His childhood was characterised by attention seeking, which has linked to his dependent personality as an adult. He was rarely allowed to return home during the term. He later wrote of his loneliness at school in the poem Frost at Midnight, With unclosed lids, from 1791 until 1794, Coleridge attended Jesus College, Cambridge. In 1792, he won the Browne Gold Medal for an ode that he wrote on the slave trade, afterwards, he was rumoured to have had a bout of severe depression. His brothers arranged for his discharge a few months later under the reason of insanity and he was readmitted to Jesus College, at Jesus College, Coleridge was introduced to political and theological ideas then considered radical, including those of the poet Robert Southey. Coleridge joined Southey in a plan, soon abandoned, to found a utopian society, called Pantisocracy
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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Coleridge in 1795
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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Signature
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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Mary Matilda Betham, Sara Coleridge (Mrs. Samuel Taylor Coleridge), Portrait miniature, 1809
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
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Image of Coleridge, from The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and The Vision of Sir Launfal (by Coleridge and
James Russell Lowell), published by
Sampson Low, 1906.
26.
Inner Mongolia
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Its capital is Hohhot, and other major cities include Baotou, Chifeng, and Ordos. It is the third largest subdivision of China, spanning approximately 1,200,000 km2 or 12% of Chinas total land area and it recorded a population of 24,706,321 in the 2010 census, accounting for 1. 84% of Mainland Chinas total population. Inner Mongolia is the countrys 23rd most populous province-level division, the majority of the population in the region is Han Chinese, with a sizeable titular Mongol minority. In Chinese, the region is known as Inner Mongolia, where the terms of Inner/Outer are derived from Manchu dorgi/tulergi. The term Inner 内 referred to the Nei Fan 内番, i. e. those descendants of Genghis Khan who granted the title khan in Ming and Qing Dynasties and lived in part of southern part of Mongolia. In recent years, some Mongols began to call Inner Mongolia Nan Menggu, literally South Mongolia, much of what is known about the history of Greater Mongolia, including Inner Mongolia, is known through Chinese chronicles and historians. Slab Grave cultural monuments are found in northern, central and eastern Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, north-western China, Mongolian scholars prove that this culture related to the Proto-Mongols. During the Zhou Dynasty, central and western Inner Mongolia were inhabited by peoples such as the Loufan, Linhu. During the Warring States period, King Wuling of the state of Zhao based in what is now Hebei, after destroying the Dí state of Zhongshan in what is now Hebei province, he defeated the Linhu and Loufan and created the commandery of Yunzhong near modern Hohhot. King Wuling of Zhao also built a long wall stretching through the Hetao region and he also maintained two commanderies in the region, Jiuyuan and Yunzhong, and moved 30,000 households there to solidify the region. After the Qin Dynasty collapsed in 206 BC, these efforts were abandoned, during the Western Han Dynasty, Emperor Wu sent the general Wei Qing to reconquer the Hetao region from the Xiongnu in 127 BC. After the conquest, Emperor Wu continued the policy of building settlements in Hetao to defend against the Xiong-Nu, in that same year he established the commanderies of Shuofang and Wuyuan in Hetao. At the same time, what is now eastern Inner Mongolia was controlled by the Xianbei, during the Eastern Han Dynasty, Xiongnu who surrendered to the Han Dynasty began to be settled in Hetao, and intermingled with the Han immigrants in the area. Hetao was then taken over by the Khitan Empire, founded by the Khitans and they were followed by the Western Xia of the Tanguts, who took control of what is now the western part of Inner Mongolia. The Khitans were later replaced by the Jurchens, precursors to the modern Manchus, after Genghis Khan unified the Mongol tribes in 1206 and founded the Mongol Empire, the Tangut Western Xia empire was ultimately conquered in 1227, and the Jurchen Jin dynasty fell in 1234. In 1271, Kublai Khan, the grandson of Genghis Khan established the Yuan dynasty, Kublai Khans summer capital Shangdu was located near present-day Dolonnor. During that time Ongud and Khunggirad peoples dominated the area of what is now Inner Mongolia, after the Yuan dynasty was overthrown by the Han-led Ming dynasty in 1368, the Ming captured parts of Inner Mongolia including Shangdu and Yingchang. The Ming rebuilt the Great Wall of China at its present location, the Ming established the Three Guards composed of the Mongols there
Inner Mongolia
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Genghis Khan entering
Beijing.
Inner Mongolia
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•
Mongolian
Inner Mongolia
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Inner Mongolia and Outer Mongolia within the Qing dynasty.
Inner Mongolia
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Part of the
Great Wall of China
27.
Forbidden City
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The Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming dynasty to the end of the Qing dynasty—the years 1420 to 1912. It is located in the center of Beijing, China, and it served as the home of emperors and their households as well as the ceremonial and political center of Chinese government for almost 500 years. Constructed from 1406 to 1420, the complex consists of 980 buildings, the palace complex exemplifies traditional Chinese palatial architecture, and has influenced cultural and architectural developments in East Asia and elsewhere. The Forbidden City was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, part of the museums former collection is now located in the National Palace Museum in Taipei. Both museums descend from the institution, but were split after the Chinese Civil War. With over 14.6 million annual visitors, the Palace Museum is the most visited art museum in the world, the common English name, the Forbidden City, is a translation of the Chinese name Zijin Cheng. The name Zijin Cheng first formally appeared in 1576, another English name of similar origin is Forbidden Palace. The name Zijin Cheng is a name with significance on many levels, zi, or Purple, refers to the North Star, which in ancient China was called the Ziwei Star, and in traditional Chinese astrology was the heavenly abode of the Celestial Emperor. The surrounding celestial region, the Ziwei Enclosure, was the realm of the Celestial Emperor, the Forbidden City, as the residence of the terrestrial emperor, was its earthly counterpart. Jin, or Forbidden, referred to the fact no one could enter or leave the palace without the emperors permission. Today, the site is most commonly known in Chinese as Gùgōng, the museum which is based in these buildings is known as the Palace Museum. When Hongwu Emperors son Zhu Di became the Yongle Emperor, he moved the capital from Nanjing to Beijing, construction lasted 14 years and required more than a million workers. Material used include whole logs of precious Phoebe zhennan wood found in the jungles of south-western China, the floors of major halls were paved with golden bricks, specially baked paving bricks from Suzhou. From 1420 to 1644, the Forbidden City was the seat of the Ming dynasty, in April 1644, it was captured by rebel forces led by Li Zicheng, who proclaimed himself emperor of the Shun dynasty. He soon fled before the armies of former Ming general Wu Sangui and Manchu forces. By October, the Manchus had achieved supremacy in northern China, the Qing rulers changed the names on some of the principal buildings, to emphasise Harmony rather than Supremacy, made the name plates bilingual, and introduced Shamanist elements to the palace. In 1860, during the Second Opium War, Anglo-French forces took control of the Forbidden City, in 1900 Empress Dowager Cixi fled from the Forbidden City during the Boxer Rebellion, leaving it to be occupied by forces of the treaty powers until the following year. Under an agreement with the new Republic of China government, Puyi remained in the Inner Court, while the Outer Court was given over to public use, the Palace Museum was then established in the Forbidden City in 1925
Forbidden City
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UNESCO World Heritage Site
Forbidden City
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The Gate of Divine Might, the northern gate. The lower tablet reads "The Palace Museum" (故 宫 博 物 院)
Forbidden City
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The Forbidden City as depicted in a
Ming dynasty painting
Forbidden City
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The East Glorious Gate under renovation as part of the 16-year restoration process
28.
Ming dynasty
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The Ming dynasty was the ruling dynasty of China – then known as the Empire of the Great Ming – for 276 years following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming, described by some as one of the greatest eras of orderly government, although the primary capital of Beijing fell in 1644 to a rebellion led by Li Zicheng, regimes loyal to the Ming throne – collectively called the Southern Ming – survived until 1683. He rewarded his supporters and employed them as a counterweight against the Confucian scholar-bureaucrats. One, Zheng He, led seven enormous voyages of exploration into the Indian Ocean as far as Arabia, the rise of new emperors and new factions diminished such extravagances, the capture of the Zhengtong Emperor during the 1449 Tumu Crisis ended them completely. The imperial navy was allowed to fall into disrepair while forced labor constructed the Liaodong palisade, haijin laws intended to protect the coasts from Japanese pirates instead turned many into smugglers and pirates themselves. The growth of Portuguese, Spanish, and Dutch trade created new demand for Chinese products and produced an influx of Japanese. This abundance of specie remonetized the Ming economy, whose money had suffered repeated hyperinflation and was no longer trusted. While traditional Confucians opposed such a prominent role for commerce and the newly rich it created, combined with crop failure, floods, and epidemic, the dynasty collapsed before the rebel leader Li Zicheng, who was defeated by the Manchu-led Eight Banner armies who founded the Qing dynasty. The Mongol-led Yuan dynasty ruled before the establishment of the Ming dynasty, consequently, agriculture and the economy were in shambles, and rebellion broke out among the hundreds of thousands of peasants called upon to work on repairing the dykes of the Yellow River. A number of Han Chinese groups revolted, including the Red Turbans in 1351, the Red Turbans were affiliated with the White Lotus, a Buddhist secret society. Zhu Yuanzhang was a peasant and Buddhist monk who joined the Red Turbans in 1352. In 1356, Zhus rebel force captured the city of Nanjing, with the Yuan dynasty crumbling, competing rebel groups began fighting for control of the country and thus the right to establish a new dynasty. In 1363, Zhu Yuanzhang eliminated his archrival and leader of the rebel Han faction, Chen Youliang, in the Battle of Lake Poyang, arguably the largest naval battle in history. Known for its ambitious use of ships, Zhus force of 200,000 Ming sailors were able to defeat a Han rebel force over triple their size, claimed to be 650. The victory destroyed the last opposing rebel faction, leaving Zhu Yuanzhang in uncontested control of the bountiful Yangtze River Valley, Zhu Yuanzhang took Hongwu, or Vastly Martial, as his era name. Hongwu made an effort to rebuild state infrastructure. He built a 48 km long wall around Nanjing, as well as new palaces, Hongwu organized a military system known as the weisuo, which was similar to the fubing system of the Tang dynasty. With a growing suspicion of his ministers and subjects, Hongwu established the Jinyiwei, some 100,000 people were executed in a series of purges during his rule
Ming dynasty
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History of China
Ming dynasty
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Ming China around 1580
Ming dynasty
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A
cannon from the
Huolongjing, compiled by
Jiao Yu and
Liu Bowen before the latter's death in 1375.
Ming dynasty
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Portrait of the
Hongwu Emperor (ruled in 1368–98)
