1.
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.
2.
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
3.
Traditional characters
–
Traditional Chinese characters are Chinese characters in any character set that does not contain newly created characters or character substitutions performed after 1946. They are most commonly the characters in the character sets of Taiwan, of Hong Kong. Currently, a number of overseas Chinese online newspapers allow users to switch between both sets. In contrast, simplified Chinese characters are used in mainland China, Singapore, the debate on traditional and simplified Chinese characters has been a long-running issue among Chinese communities. Although simplified characters are taught and endorsed by the government of Mainland China, Traditional characters are used informally in regions in China primarily in handwriting and also used for inscriptions and religious text. They are often retained in logos or graphics to evoke yesteryear, nonetheless, the vast majority of media and communications in China is dominated by simplified characters. Taiwan has never adopted Simplified Chinese characters since it is ruled by the Republic of China, the use of simplified characters in official documents is even prohibited by the government in Taiwan. Simplified characters are not well understood in general, although some stroke simplifications that have incorporated into Simplified Chinese are in common use in handwriting. For example, while the name of Taiwan is written as 臺灣, similarly, in Hong Kong and Macau, Traditional Chinese has been the legal written form since colonial times. In recent years, because of the influx of mainland Chinese tourists, today, even government websites use simplified Chinese, as they answer to the Beijing government. This has led to concerns by residents to protect their local heritage. In Southeast Asia, the Chinese Filipino community continues to be one of the most conservative regarding simplification, while major public universities are teaching simplified characters, many well-established Chinese schools still use traditional characters. Publications like the Chinese Commercial News, World News, and United Daily News still use traditional characters, on the other hand, the Philippine Chinese Daily uses simplified. Aside from local newspapers, magazines from Hong Kong, such as the Yazhou Zhoukan, are found in some bookstores. In case of film or television subtitles on DVD, the Chinese dub that is used in Philippines is the same as the one used in Taiwan and this is because the DVDs belongs to DVD Region Code 3. Hence, most of the subtitles are in Traditional Characters, overseas Chinese in the United States have long used traditional characters. A major influx of Chinese immigrants to the United States occurred during the half of the 19th century. Therefore, the majority of Chinese language signage in the United States, including street signs, Traditional Chinese characters are called several different names within the Chinese-speaking world
Traditional characters
–
Chinese characters
Traditional characters
–
Traditional Chinese
Traditional characters
–
Job announcement in a Filipino Chinese daily newspaper written in Traditional Chinese characters.
Traditional characters
–
A Series of Reading workbook in Traditional Chinese used in some Elementary schools in the Philippines.
4.
Simplified characters
–
Simplified Chinese characters are standardized Chinese characters prescribed in the Table of General Standard Chinese Characters for use in mainland China. Along with traditional Chinese characters, it is one of the two character sets of the contemporary Chinese written language. The government of the Peoples Republic of China in mainland China has promoted them for use in printing since the 1950s and 1960s in an attempt to increase literacy and they are officially used in the Peoples Republic of China and Singapore. Traditional Chinese characters are used in Hong Kong, Macau. Overseas Chinese communities generally tend to use traditional characters, Simplified Chinese characters may be referred to by their official name above or colloquially. Strictly, the latter refers to simplifications of character structure or body, character forms that have existed for thousands of years alongside regular, Simplified character forms were created by decreasing the number of strokes and simplifying the forms of a sizable proportion of traditional Chinese characters. Some simplifications were based on popular cursive forms embodying graphic or phonetic simplifications of the traditional forms, some characters were simplified by applying regular rules, for example, by replacing all occurrences of a certain component with a simplified version of the component. Variant characters with the pronunciation and identical meaning were reduced to a single standardized character. Finally, many characters were left untouched by simplification, and are identical between the traditional and simplified Chinese orthographies. Some simplified characters are very dissimilar to and unpredictably different from traditional characters and this often leads opponents not well-versed in the method of simplification to conclude that the overall process of character simplification is also arbitrary. In reality, the methods and rules of simplification are few, on the other hand, proponents of simplification often flaunt a few choice simplified characters as ingenious inventions, when in fact these have existed for hundreds of years as ancient variants. However, the Chinese government never officially dropped its goal of further simplification in the future, in August 2009, the PRC began collecting public comments for a modified list of simplified characters. The new Table of General Standard Chinese Characters consisting of 8,105 characters was promulgated by the State Council of the Peoples Republic of China on June 5,2013, cursive written text almost always includes character simplification. Simplified forms used in print have always existed, they date back to as early as the Qin dynasty, One of the earliest proponents of character simplification was Lubi Kui, who proposed in 1909 that simplified characters should be used in education. In the years following the May Fourth Movement in 1919, many anti-imperialist Chinese intellectuals sought ways to modernise China, Traditional culture and values such as Confucianism were challenged. Soon, people in the Movement started to cite the traditional Chinese writing system as an obstacle in modernising China and it was suggested that the Chinese writing system should be either simplified or completely abolished. Fu Sinian, a leader of the May Fourth Movement, called Chinese characters the writing of ox-demons, lu Xun, a renowned Chinese author in the 20th century, stated that, If Chinese characters are not destroyed, then China will die. Recent commentators have claimed that Chinese characters were blamed for the problems in China during that time
Simplified characters
–
Chinese characters
Simplified characters
–
Simplified Chinese
Simplified characters
–
The first batch of Simplified Characters introduced in 1935 consisted of 324 characters.
Simplified characters
–
The slogan 战无不胜的毛泽东思想万岁 (Zhàn wúbù shèng de Máo Zédōng sīxiǎng wànsuì; Long live the invincible
Mao Zedong Thought) on
Xinhua Gate in Beijing.
5.
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
Pinyin
–
A school slogan asking elementary students to speak
Putonghua is annotated with pinyin, but without tonal marks.
Pinyin
–
In
Yiling,
Yichang,
Hubei, text on road signs appears both in Chinese characters and in Hanyu Pinyin
6.
Shanghainese
–
The Shanghainese language, also known as the Shanghai dialect, Hu language or Hu dialect, is a variety of Wu Chinese spoken in the central districts of the City of Shanghai and its surrounding areas. It is classified as part of the Sino-Tibetan language family, in English, Shanghainese sometimes refers to all Wu languages, variants and dialects, although they are only partially intelligible with one another. Shanghainese proper is a language of Taihu Wu, it contains vocabulary and expressions from the entire Taihu Wu area of southern Jiangsu. With nearly 14 million speakers, Shanghainese is also the largest single form of Wu Chinese and it serves as the lingua franca of the entire Yangtze River Delta region. Shanghainese is rich in vowels and in consonants, like other Taihu Wu dialects, Shanghainese has voiced initials. Neither Cantonese nor Mandarin has voiced initial stops or affricates, the Shanghainese tonal system is also significantly different from other Chinese varieties, sharing more similarities with the Japanese pitch accent. Shanghainese has two level tonal contrasts, while Cantonese and Mandarin are typical of contour tonal languages, Shanghai did not become a regional center of commerce until it was opened to foreign investment during the late Qing dynasty. Consequently, languages and dialects spoken around Shanghai had long been subordinate to those spoken around Jiaxing, in the late 19th century, most vocabulary of the Shanghai region had been a hybrid between Southern Jiangsu and Ningbonese. It underwent sustained growth that reached a hiatus in the 1930s during the Republican era, after 1949, the government imposed Mandarin as the official language of the whole nation of China. The dominance and influence of Shanghainese began to wane slightly, especially since Chinese economic reform began in 1978, Shanghai became home to a great number of migrants from all over the country. Due to the prominence of Mandarin, learning Shanghainese was no longer necessary for migrants. However, Shanghainese remained a vital part of the citys culture. In the 1990s, it was common for local radio. In 1995, the TV series Sinful Debt featured extensive Shanghainese dialogues, the Shanghainese TV series Lao Niang Jiu was broadcast from 1995 to 2007 and received tremendous popularity among Shanghainese residents. Shanghainese programming has since declined, over concerns of regionalist/localist accusations. From 1992 onward, Shanghainese use was discouraged in schools, in addition, Shanghais emergence as a cosmopolitan global city consolidated the status of Mandarin as the standard language of business and services, at the expense of the local language. Since 2005, new movements have emerged to protect Shanghainese from fading away, Shanghais former party boss Chen Liangyu, a native Shanghainese himself, reportedly supported her proposal. There have been talks of re-integrating Shanghainese into pre-kindergarten education, because children are unable to speak any Shanghainese
Shanghainese
–
A table of Shanghai Phonetic Symbols by Rev. J. A. Silsby
Shanghainese
–
Administrative divisions
7.
Chinese garden
–
The Chinese garden is a landscape garden style which has evolved over three thousand years. They create a miniature landscape, which is meant to express the harmony that should exist between man and nature. The earliest recorded Chinese gardens were created in the valley of the Yellow River and these gardens were large enclosed parks where the kings and nobles hunted game, or where fruit and vegetables were grown. Early inscriptions from this period, carved on tortoise shells, have three Chinese characters for garden, you, pu and yuan and you was a royal garden where birds and animals were kept, while pu was a garden for plants. During the Qin Dynasty, yuan became the character for all gardens, a famous royal garden of the late Shang dynasty was the Terrace, Pond and Park of the Spirit built by King Wenwang west of his capital city, Yin. The immaculate cranes have plumes of a brilliant white, the Emperor makes his promenade to the Pond of the Spirit, The water is full of fish, who wriggle. - translation in Jardins de Chine, ou la quête du paradis Another early royal garden was Shaqui, or the Dunes of Sand, built by the last Shang ruler, King Zhou. It was composed of a terrace, or tai, which served as an observation platform in the center of a large square park. It was described in one of the classics of Chinese literature. According to the Shiji, one of the most famous features of this garden was the Wine Pool, a large pool, big enough for several small boats, was constructed on the palace grounds, with inner linings of polished oval shaped stones from the sea shores. The pool was filled with wine. A small island was constructed in the middle of the pool, where trees were planted, King Zhou and his friends and concubines drifted in their boats, drinking the wine with their hands and eating the roasted meat from the trees. Later Chinese philosophers and historians cited this garden as an example of decadence, during the Spring and Autumn period, in 535 BC, the Terrace of Shanghua, with lavishly decorated palaces, was built by King Jing of the Zhou dynasty. In 505 BC, a more elaborate garden, the Terrace of Gusu, was begun. It was located on the side of a mountain, and included a series of terraces connected by galleries, from the highest terrace, a view extended as far as Lake Tai, the Great Lake. An ancient Chinese legend played an important part in early garden design, on this island were palaces of gold and silver, with jewels on the trees. There was no pain, no winter, wine glasses and rice bowls were always full, and fruits, in 221 BC, Ying Zheng, the King of Qin conquered other rival states and unified China under the Qin Empire, which he ruled until 210 BC. He heard the legend of the islands and sent emissaries to find the islands and bring back the elixir of immortal life, at his palace near his capital, Xianyang, he created a garden with a large lake called Lanchi gong or the Lake of the Orchids
Chinese garden
–
This picture of the
Yuyuan Garden in
Shanghai (created in 1559) shows all the elements of a classical Chinese garden – water, architecture, vegetation, and rocks.
Chinese garden
–
A miniature version of
Mount Penglai, the legendary home of the
Eight Immortals, was recreated in many classical Chinese gardens
Chinese garden
–
The calligrapher
Wang Xizhi in his garden, the Orchid Pavilion
Chinese garden
–
The Lake of the Clarity of Gold, an artificial lake and pleasure garden built by
Emperor Huizong of Song at his capital,
Kaifeng
8.
City God Temple of Shanghai
–
The City God Temple or Temple of the City Gods, officially the City Temple of Shanghai, is a folk temple located in the old city of Shanghai, China. It commemorates the elevation of Shanghai to municipal status and is the site of the veneration of three Chinese figures honored as the city gods of the town. It is also known by locals as the Old City God Temple. In Chinese, Chenghuangmiao is also used as the name of the district near the temple. This is generally known in English as Yu Garden, after a nearby Chinese garden, the district is now incorporated under the name Yuyuan Tourist Mart. Regardless of size, many walled cities in ancient China contained a dedicated to one or more immortal or god as the spirit or protector of the city. The City God Temple in Shanghai originated as the Jinshan God Temple, dedicated to the spirit of Jinshan, or Gold Mountain and it was converted into a City God Temple in 1403, during the Yongle era of the Ming dynasty. During the Qing Dynasty, the temple grew popular, residents of the old city as well as nearby areas visited the temple to pray for good fortune and peace. The temple reached its largest extent in the Daoguang era, the popularity of the temple also led to many businesses being set up in the area, turning the surrounding streets into a busy marketplace. During the Cultural Revolution, the temple was closed down and used for other purposes, for many years, the main hall was used as a jewellery shop. In 1951, the Board of Trustees of the City God Temple was dissolved, the institution made changes to the temple, removing statues representing folk underworld personalities such as Yama, the judge of the dead, and placing an emphasis on Taoist spirituality instead. In 1994, the temple was restored to its use as a temple. The Temple, together with nearby Yuyuan Garden and the streets, are now part of a large pedestrian zone dedicated to restaurants. A complete restoration of the City God Temple took place between 2005 and 2006, in October 2006 the place of worship was reopened and reconsecrated by Taoist clergymen. The temple is dedicated to three city gods, Huo Guang was a famous Han Dynasty Chancellor and he is remembered for his role in deposing one young emperor and replacing him with another. Huo Guang was the original City God for the County of Shanghai from the Yuan Dynasty, qin Yubo lived in Shanghai and served in the late Yuan Dynasty civil service. When the Hongwu Emperor founded the Ming Dynasty, he resisted two summons to serve at the court and he finally relented, and served in various roles including chief Imperial examiner. After his death, he was anointed City God of Shanghai by the Hongwu Emperor, chen Huacheng was a Qing Dynasty general, responsible for the defence of Shanghai during the First Opium War
City God Temple of Shanghai
–
The main hall of the City God Temple
City God Temple of Shanghai
–
A
paifang adjacent to the temple
City God Temple of Shanghai
–
One of the altars of the temple
9.
Old City of Shanghai
–
The Old City of Shanghai, also formerly known as the Chinese city, is the traditional urban core of Shanghai, China. Its boundary was defined by a defensive wall. The Old City was the county seat for the old county of Shanghai, with the advent of foreign concessions in Shanghai, the Old City became just one part of Shanghais urban core but continued for decades to be the seat of the Chinese authority in Shanghai. Notable features include the City God Temple which is located in the center of the Old City and is connected to the Yuyuan Garden, the Old City was for decades essentially coterminous with the old Nanshi District, which is now part of Huangpu District. There may have some sort of defensive works around the county seat of Shanghai from the 11th century. It measured 10 metres high and 5 kilometres in circumference, in addition to the local garrison, the city was surrounded by Qing army posts at Jiangning, Jingkou, Hangzhou, and Zhapu. In 1860 a new gate was created, the New Northern Gate, in 1909, three new gates were pierced, the Small Western Gate the Small Northern Gate the New Eastern Gate. The Old City walls were dismantled in 1912 by General Chen Qimei, apart from two small preserved sections, the walls were demolished in 1912, and a broad circular avenue built in the place of the wall and moat. The northern half of the road was completed in 1913. In 1914, the part of the circular road was completed. Together, the names of the two roads made up Zhonghua Minguo, or Republic of China in Chinese. Today only two small sections remain. The more significant of these is one of the towers over the gate, after the Opium War in 1842, various foreign concessions were established in Shanghai. The Old City remained under Chinese control, while the foreign concessions to its north, the Old City became known to the increasingly cosmopolitan populace as the Chinese City, or the Southern City to the local Chinese, whereas the concessions were called the Northern City. Initially, only foreigners could settle in the concessions, while newly arrived Chinese migrants lived in packed conditions in the Old City, during the Taiping Rebellion in 1853, the Old City was captured by the forces of the Small Swords Society. The Governor of Shanghai Wu Jianzhang fled to the British Concession and had to control of trade to the foreigners in exchange for help in retaking the city. In 1267, in the Song Dynasty, Shanghai was raised to township status, with a military garrison, within Huating County. In 1277, Shanghai township was chosen as the location of one of seven customs authorities across the empire to handle overseas trade, the location of the customs office, became a centre around which the Old City grew
Old City of Shanghai
–
A 17th-century painting showing the city wall of the Old City of Shanghai and the river port outside the wall.
Old City of Shanghai
–
Map of Shanghai in
Shanghai Xianzhi. Map of Shanghai in 1553 (published in 1813). Map of Shanghai (made circa 1860) Map of Shanghai (made circa 1860) Red: Old gates. Blue: Water gates. Green: New gates (1909)
Old City of Shanghai
Old City of Shanghai
10.
Shanghai
–
Shanghai is the most populous city proper in the world, with a population of more than 24 million as of 2014. As one of the four direct-controlled municipalities of the Peoples Republic of China, it is a financial centre and transport hub. Located in the Yangtze River Delta in East China, Shanghai sits on the edge of the mouth of the Yangtze in the middle portion of the eastern Chinese coast. The municipality borders the provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang to the north, south and west, as a major administrative, shipping and trading city, Shanghai grew in importance in the 19th century due to trade and recognition of its favourable port location and economic potential. The city was one of five treaty ports forced open to foreign trade following the British victory over China in the First Opium War, the subsequent 1842 Treaty of Nanking and 1844 Treaty of Whampoa allowed the establishment of the Shanghai International Settlement and the French Concession. The city then flourished as a center of commerce between China and other parts of the world, and became the financial hub of the Asia-Pacific region in the 1930s. However, with the Communist Party takeover of the mainland in 1949, trade was limited to other socialist countries, and the citys global influence declined. In the 1990s, the reforms introduced by Deng Xiaoping resulted in an intense re-development of the city, aiding the return of finance. The two Chinese characters in the name are 上 and 海, together meaning Upon-the-Sea. The earliest occurrence of this dates from the 11th-century Song Dynasty, at which time there was already a river confluence. There are disputes as to exactly how the name should be understood, Shanghai is officially abbreviated 沪 in Chinese, a contraction of 沪渎, a 4th- or 5th-century Jin name for the mouth of Suzhou Creek when it was the main conduit into the ocean. This character appears on all motor vehicle license plates issued in the municipality today, another alternative name for Shanghai is Shēn or Shēnchéng, from Lord Chunshen, a third-century BC nobleman and prime minister of the state of Chu, whose fief included modern Shanghai. Sports teams and newspapers in Shanghai often use Shen in their names, such as Shanghai Shenhua F. C. Huating was another early name for Shanghai. In AD751, during the dynasty, Huating County was established at modern-day Songjiang. Today, Huating appears as the name of a hotel in the city. The city also has various nicknames in English, including Pearl of the Orient, during the Spring and Autumn period, the Shanghai area belonged to the Kingdom of Wu, which was conquered by the Kingdom of Yue, which in turn was conquered by the Kingdom of Chu. During the Warring States period, Shanghai was part of the fief of Lord Chunshen of Chu and he ordered the excavation of the Huangpu River. Its former or poetic name, the Chunshen River, gave Shanghai its nickname of Shen, two important events helped promote Shanghais development in the Ming dynasty
Shanghai
–
Clockwise from top: A view of the
Pudong skyline,
Yu Garden,
China Pavilion along with the
Expo Axis, neon signs on
Nanjing Road, and
The Bund
Shanghai
–
The walled
Old City of Shanghai in the 17th century
Shanghai
–
Shanghai in the 1930s, with the
Shanghai International Settlement and
Shanghai French Concession
Shanghai
–
The Bund in 1928; the WWI monument in the foreground was destroyed by the Japanese during WWII
11.
China
–
China, officially the Peoples Republic of China, is a unitary sovereign state in East Asia and the worlds most populous country, with a population of over 1.381 billion. The state is governed by the Communist Party of China and its capital is Beijing, the countrys major urban areas include Shanghai, Guangzhou, Beijing, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Tianjin and Hong Kong. China is a power and a major regional power within Asia. Chinas landscape is vast and diverse, ranging from forest steppes, the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separate China from much of South and Central Asia. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third and sixth longest in the world, respectively, Chinas coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometers long and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East China and South China seas. China emerged as one of the worlds earliest civilizations in the basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain. For millennia, Chinas political system was based on hereditary monarchies known as dynasties, in 1912, the Republic of China replaced the last dynasty and ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949, when it was defeated by the communist Peoples Liberation Army in the Chinese Civil War. The Communist Party established the Peoples Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949, both the ROC and PRC continue to claim to be the legitimate government of all China, though the latter has more recognition in the world and controls more territory. China had the largest economy in the world for much of the last two years, during which it has seen cycles of prosperity and decline. Since the introduction of reforms in 1978, China has become one of the worlds fastest-growing major economies. As of 2016, it is the worlds second-largest economy by nominal GDP, China is also the worlds largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. China is a nuclear weapons state and has the worlds largest standing army. The PRC is a member of the United Nations, as it replaced the ROC as a permanent member of the U. N. Security Council in 1971. China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the BCIM, the English name China is first attested in Richard Edens 1555 translation of the 1516 journal of the Portuguese explorer Duarte Barbosa. The demonym, that is, the name for the people, Portuguese China is thought to derive from Persian Chīn, and perhaps ultimately from Sanskrit Cīna. Cīna was first used in early Hindu scripture, including the Mahābhārata, there are, however, other suggestions for the derivation of China. The official name of the state is the Peoples Republic of China. The shorter form is China Zhōngguó, from zhōng and guó and it was then applied to the area around Luoyi during the Eastern Zhou and then to Chinas Central Plain before being used as an occasional synonym for the state under the Qing
China
–
Yinxu, ruins of an ancient
palace dating from the
Shang Dynasty (14th century BCE)
China
–
Flag
China
–
Some of the thousands of life-size
Terracotta Warriors of the
Qin Dynasty, c. 210 BCE
China
–
The
Great Wall of China was built by several dynasties over two thousand years to protect the sedentary agricultural regions of the
Chinese interior from incursions by
nomadic pastoralists of the northern
steppes.
12.
Yuyuan Tourist Mart
–
Shanghai Yuyuan Tourist Mart Co. Ltd. is the largest retailing conglomerate in China. As at 19 November 2016, Yuyuan Tourist Mart is a constituent of SSE180 Index, Yuyuan Tourist Mart was formerly Yuyuan Shopping Mall, which was not a company but an administrative organization to manage the shops in Yuyuan Garden. In 1980s, some of the shops in there were integrated to form an enterprise, in 1987, Yuyuan Shopping Mall was approved to become the first commercial holding company in Shanghai. In 1988, its shares were listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange, in 1992, to unify the operations and management of the shopping mall, Shanghai Yuyuan Tourist Mart Co. Ltd. was established and listed on the Shanghai Stock Exchange to replace the old listed company. In 2002, a consortium of Fosun High Technology and its major shareholder Guangxin Technology, acquired 20% of shares of Yuyuan Tourist Mart, Fosun High Technologys parent company became Fosun International some time later, as well as Fosun High Technology acquired the 10% stake from Guangxin Technology. Yuyuan Garden Shanghai Yuyuan Tourist Mart Company Limited
Yuyuan Tourist Mart
Yuyuan Tourist Mart
–
Gate to market by day
Yuyuan Tourist Mart
–
The gate to the Yuyuan market at night
Yuyuan Tourist Mart
–
Yuyuan at night
13.
Shanghai Metro
–
The Shanghai Metro is a rapid transit system in Shanghai, China, operating urban and suburban rail transit services to 13 of its 16 municipal districts and to Huaqiao Town, Kunshan, Jiangsu Province. Opening in 1993 with full-scale construction extending back to 1986, Shanghai Metro is the third oldest rapid transit system in China, after the Beijing Subway and the Tianjin Metro. It has seen growth, significantly during the years leading up to the 2010 Shanghai World Expo. The metro system is heavily tied with other forms of public transport in Shanghai. Currently, the Shanghai Metro system is the worlds largest rapid transit system by route length and it also ranks second in the world by annual ridership after the Beijing Subway, with 3.4 billion rides delivered in 2016. The daily ridership record was set at 11.7 million on March 20,2017, further plans to connect the Shanghai Metro with the metro systems of Suzhou and Wuxi are under active review. The first line connecting Shanghai Metro Line 11 and Suzhou Metro Line 3 is projected to be completed in 2020, ambitious expansion plans call for 25 Lines with over 1,000 km of length by 2025. By then, every location in the area of Shanghai will be within 600 meters of a subway station. May 28,1993 – Southern section of Line 1 enters operation, April 10,1995 – Line 1 enters operation. December 28,1996 – Southern extension to Line 1 enters operation, sept 20,1999 – Line 2 enters operation. December 26,2000 – The eastern extension to Line 2, november 25,2003 – Line 5 enters operation. December 28,2004 – Northern extension to Line 1 enters operation, December 31,2005 – Line 4 enters operation, except the section between Lancun Road and Damuqiao Road that was delayed due to a construction accident. December 18,2006 – Northern extension to Line 3 enters operation, December 30,2006 – Western extension to Line 2 enters operation. December 29,2007 – Five lines or sections enter operation on the day, Second northern extension to Line 1 Delayed section of Line 4. Line 6 Line 8 Line 9 December 28,2008 – Line 9 is extended from Guilin Road to Yishan Road, July 5,2009 – Southern extension to Line 8 enters operation. December 5,2009 – Line 7 enters operation, December 31,2009 – The downtown section of Line 9 and the first section of Line 11 open. February 24,2010 – Short section of extension of Line 2 enters operation. Zhangjiang Hi-tech Park station is rebuilt underground, March 16,2010 – Second western extension to Line 2 enters operation, connecting Hongqiao Airport to the metro system
Shanghai Metro
–
Line 1
Shanghai Metro
–
System map
Shanghai Metro
–
Line 2
Shanghai Metro
–
Line 11
14.
Line 10, Shanghai Metro
–
Line 10 is a southwest-northeast line of the Shanghai Metro network. It officially opened for service on April 10,2010, and has a main line, the first phase of the main line currently runs from New Jiangwan Town to Longxi Road, the branch line runs from Longxi Road on the main line to Hangzhong Road. The extension to Hongqiao Railway Station has operated since December 2010 and it connects the Hongqiao International Airport with the downtown core of Shanghai, and also the dense residential districts of Yangpu and Hongkou. The line is colored mauve on system maps, Hongqiao Railway Station - Located within / below Hongqiao Railway Station. Hongqiao Airport Terminal 2 - Located within Hongqiao International Airport, Shanghai Zoo - Located near the Shanghai Zoo in Changning District. South Shaanxi Road - Interchange with Line 1, Xintiandi - Located in the Xintiandi shopping area. Laoximen - Interchange with Line 8, Yuyuan Garden - Located near the famous Yuyuan Garden. East Nanjing Road - Located under the pedestrianised Nanjing Road and close to The Bund, Tongji University station - Located near the Tongji University. The second phase, in planning, is a extension of the first phase of Line 10 from New Jiangwan Town to Huandongyi Avenue. This phase will be completed by 2020
Line 10, Shanghai Metro
–
Line 10, Shanghai Metro
Line 10, Shanghai Metro
–
Side view of the front car of a Line 10 train
15.
Yuyuan Garden Station
–
Yuyuan Garden Station is a station on Line 10 of the Shanghai Metro. It is located near the famous Yuyuan Garden in Huangpu District, the station entered operation in April 2010. This station is likely to be a station between Line 10 and Line 14 in the future
Yuyuan Garden Station
–
Platform at station
16.
Forbidden City
–
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
–
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Forbidden City
–
The Gate of Divine Might, the northern gate. The lower tablet reads "The Palace Museum" (故 宫 博 物 院)
Forbidden City
–
The Forbidden City as depicted in a
Ming dynasty painting
Forbidden City
–
The East Glorious Gate under renovation as part of the 16-year restoration process
17.
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.
18.
Ming Dynasty
–
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
–
History of China
Ming Dynasty
–
Ming China around 1580
Ming Dynasty
–
A
cannon from the
Huolongjing, compiled by
Jiao Yu and
Liu Bowen before the latter's death in 1375.
Ming Dynasty
–
Portrait of the
Hongwu Emperor (ruled in 1368–98)
19.
Imperial exam
–
The Chinese imperial examinations were a civil service examination system in Imperial China to select candidates for the state bureaucracy. The examination helped to shape Chinas intellectual, cultural, political, shopping, arts and crafts, the increased reliance on the exam system was in part responsible for Tang dynasty shifting from a military aristocracy to a gentry class of scholar-bureaucrats. Starting with the Song dynasty, the system was regularized and developed into a roughly three-tiered ladder from local to provincial to court exams, the content was narrowed and fixed on texts of Neo-Confucian orthodoxy. Critics charged that the system stifled creativity and created officials who dared not defy authority, wealthy families, especially merchants, could opt into the system by educating their sons or purchasing degrees. In the 19th century, critics blamed the system, and in the process its examinations, for Chinas lack of technical knowledge. The influence of the Chinese examination system spread to neighboring Asian countries, such as Vietnam, Korea, Japan, following the initial success in that company, the British government adopted a similar testing system for screening civil servants in 1855. Other European nations, such as France and Germany, followed suit, modeled after these previous adaptations, the U. S established its own testing program for certain government jobs after 1883. However, the structure of the system was extensively expanded during the reign of Wu Zetian. Thus the system played a key role in the selection of the scholar-officials, during the Ming and Qing dynasties, the system contributed to the narrowness of intellectual life and the autocratic power of the emperor. The system continued with some modifications until its 1905 abolition under the Qing dynasty, other brief interruptions to the system occurred, such as at the beginning of the Yuan dynasty in the 13th century. The modern examination system for selecting civil servants also indirectly evolved from the imperial one and this changed during the Sui, when recruitment into the imperial civil service bureaucracy became to be considered an imperial prerogative, rather than a duty to be performed by the lower levels. By the Tang dynasty, most of the recruitment into central government bureaucrat offices was being performed by the bureaucracy itself, the regular higher level degree examination cycle was nominally decreed in 1067 to be 3 years. The jinshi tests were not an event and should not be considered so. Oral examination on policy issues were sometimes conducted personally by the emperor himself, beginning in the Three Kingdoms period, imperial officials were responsible for assessing the quality of the talents recommended by the local elites. This system continued until Emperor Yang of Sui established a new category of recommended candidates for the mandarinate in AD605, for the first time, an examination system was explicitly instituted for a category of local talents. However, the Sui dynasty was short-lived, and the system did not reach its mature development until afterwards, a pivotal point in the development of imperial examinations arose with the rise of Wu Zetian. Up until that point, the rulers of the Tang dynasty were all members of the Li family. Reform of the examinations to include a new class of elite bureaucrats derived from humbler origins became a keystone of Wus gamble to retain power
Imperial exam
–
Candidates gathering around the wall where the results are posted. This announcement was known as "releasing the roll" (放榜). (c. 1540, by
Qiu Ying)
Imperial exam
–
Chinese Examination Cells at the South River School (Nanjiangxue) Nanjing (China). Shown without curtains or other furnishings.
Imperial exam
–
A model of exam cells displayed at
Beijing Imperial Academy
Imperial exam
–
The emperor receives a candidate during the Palace Examination. Song dynasty.
20.
First Opium War
–
European silver flowed into China when the Canton System, instituted in the mid-18th century, confined the sea trade to Canton and to the Chinese merchants of the Thirteen Factories. The British East India Company had a monopoly of British trade. The British East India Company began to auction opium grown on its plantations in India to independent foreign traders in exchange for silver, the opium was then transported to the Chinese coast and sold to local middlemen who retailed the drug inside China. This reverse flow of silver and the numbers of opium addicts alarmed Chinese officials. In 1839, the Daoguang Emperor, rejecting proposals to legalise and tax opium, Lin confiscated around 20,000 chests of opium without offering compensation, blockaded trade, and confined foreign merchants to their quarters. The failure of the treaty to satisfy British goals of improved trade, in China, the war is considered the beginning of modern Chinese history. Direct maritime trade between Europe and China began in 1557 when the Portuguese leased an outpost at Macau, after the Spanish conquest of the Philippines, the exchange of goods between China and western Europe accelerated dramatically. From 1565, the annual Manila Galleon brought in enormous amounts of silver to the Asian trade network, from 1700–1842, Guangzhou came to dominate maritime trade with China, and this period became known as the Canton System. Official British trade was conducted through the auspices of the British East India Company, the British East India Company gradually came to dominate Sino-European trade from its position in India. From the inception of the Canton System in 1757, trade in goods from China was extremely lucrative for European, however, foreign traders were only permitted to do business through a body of Chinese merchants known as the Cohong and were restricted to Canton. Foreigners could only live in one of the Thirteen Factories, near Shameen Island, while silk and porcelain drove trade through their popularity in the west, an insatiable demand for tea existed in Britain. However, only silver was accepted in payment by China, which resulted in a trade deficit. From the mid-17th century around 28 million kilograms of silver were received by China, principally from European powers, Britain had been on the gold standard since the 18th century, so it had to purchase silver from continental Europe and Mexico to supply the Chinese appetite for silver. Attempts by a British embassy, a Dutch mission, Russias Golovkin in 1805, by 1817, the British realized they could reduce the trade deficit as well as turn the Indian colony profitable by counter-trading in narcotic Indian opium. Opium was produced in traditionally cotton-growing regions of India under British East India Company monopoly, both areas had been hard hit by the introduction of factory-produced cotton cloth, which used cotton grown in Egypt. The opium was auctioned in Calcutta on the condition that it be shipped by British traders to China, Opium as a medicinal ingredient was documented in texts as early as the Tang dynasty but its recreational use was limited and there were laws against its abuse. British sales of opium began in 1781, and sales increased fivefold between 1821 and 1837, by 1820, just when the Qing treasury needed to finance the suppression of rebellions, the flow of silver had reversed, Chinese merchants were now exporting it to pay for opium. The imperial court debated whether or how to end the opium trade, Napier was instructed to obey Chinese regulations, communicate directly with Chinese authorities, superintend trade pertaining to the contraband trade of opium, and to survey Chinas coastline
First Opium War
–
The
Nemesis destroying Chinese war
junks during the
Second Battle of Chuenpee, 7 January 1841
First Opium War
–
View of Canton with merchant ship of the
Dutch East India Company, c. 1665
First Opium War
–
View of the
European factories in
Canton
First Opium War
–
Chinese opium smokers
21.
Taiping Rebellion
–
The war was mostly fought in the provinces of Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangxi and Hubei, but over 14 years of war the Taiping Army had marched through every province of China proper except Gansu. Hostilities began on January 1,1851, when the Qing Green Standard Army launched an attack against the God Worshipping Society at the town of Jintian, Guangxi. Hong declared himself the Heavenly King of the Heavenly Kingdom of Peace, the Taipings began marching north in September 1851 to escape Qing forces closing in on them. On March 19,1853, the Taipings captured the city of Nanjing and Hong declared it the Heavenly Capital of his kingdom. For a decade the Taiping occupied and fought much of the mid and lower Yangzi valley. Qing imperial troops proved to be ineffective in halting Taiping advances. In Hunan Province a local irregular army called the Xiang Army or Hunan Army, under the leadership of Zeng Guofan. Zengs Xiang Army proved effective in turning back the Taiping advance in the western theater of the war. In 1856 the Taiping were weakened after infighting following a coup led by the East King, Yang Xiuqing. During this time the Xiang Army managed to retake much of Hubei. While Taiping forces were preoccupied in Jiangsu, Zengs forces moved down the Yangzi River, in May 1862 the Xiang Army began directly besieging Nanjing and managed to hold firm despite numerous attempts by the numerically superior Taiping Army to dislodge them. Hong died on June 1,1864, and Nanjing fell shortly after, the terms used for the movement often reflect the viewpoint of the writer. The Qing referred to the Taiping as Yue Bandits in official sources, in the 19th century Western observers, depending on their ideological position, referred to the Taiping as the revolutionaries, insurgents or rebels. The conflict in general has been called the Taiping Rebellion by many Western historians and they argue, instead, that the conflict should be called a civil war. The government, led by ethnic Manchus, was seen by many Han Chinese as ineffective, anti-Manchu sentiments were strongest in southern China among the Hakka community, a Han Chinese subgroup. In 1837 Hong Xiuquan, a Hakka from a mountain village, once again failed the imperial examination. He returned home, fell sick and was bedridden for several days and it was his duty to spread his message and overthrow the Qing dynasty. One of Hongs associates, Yang Xiuqing--a firewood merchant from Guangxi--also declared that he heard the voice of God
Taiping Rebellion
–
Image of the Battle of Anqing (1861)
Taiping Rebellion
–
Contemporary drawing of Hong Xiuquan, dating from about 1860
Taiping Rebellion
–
Retaking of
Suzhou city by Qing troops
Taiping Rebellion
–
A historic monument to the Taiping Rebellion in Mengshan town, in
Wuzhou,
Guangxi, which was an early seat of Government of the Taiping
22.
Shanghai municipal government
–
The Politics of Shanghai is structured in a dual party-government system like all other governing institutions in the mainland of the Peoples Republic of China. In the last few decades the city has produced many of the eventual senior leaders, including Jiang Zemin, Zhu Rongji, Wu Bangguo. The Mayor of the Shanghai Municipal Peoples Government is the highest ranking official in Shanghai. Since Shanghai is a municipality of China, the mayor occupies the same level in the order of precedence as provincial governors. Before 1941, Shanghai had an administration, the International Settlement, the French Concession. The Chinese city was invaded by the Japanese in 1937 and the concessions were occupied by the Japanese in 1941. After the occupation, the foreign powers formally ceded the territory to the Nationalist Government in Chongqing, prior to the establishment of the office of Mayor of Shanghai, the citys administration was overseen by the circuit intendant. The office was abolished at the fall of the Qing
Shanghai municipal government
–
Shanghai municipal government building.
Shanghai municipal government
–
Administrative divisions
23.
Hectare
–
The hectare is an SI accepted metric system unit of area equal to 100 ares and primarily used in the measurement of land as a metric replacement for the imperial acre. An acre is about 0.405 hectare and one hectare contains about 2.47 acres, in 1795, when the metric system was introduced, the are was defined as 100 square metres and the hectare was thus 100 ares or 1⁄100 km2. When the metric system was further rationalised in 1960, resulting in the International System of Units, the are was not included as a recognised unit. The hectare, however, remains as a non-SI unit accepted for use with the SI units, the metric system of measurement was first given a legal basis in 1795 by the French Revolutionary government. At the first meeting of the CGPM in 1889 when a new standard metre, manufactured by Johnson Matthey & Co of London was adopted, in 1960, when the metric system was updated as the International System of Units, the are did not receive international recognition. The units that were catalogued replicated the recommendations of the CGPM, many farmers, especially older ones, still use the acre for everyday calculations, and convert to hectares only for official paperwork. Farm fields can have long histories which are resistant to change, with names such as the six acre field stretching back hundreds of years. The names centiare, deciare, decare and hectare are derived by adding the standard metric prefixes to the base unit of area. The centiare is a synonym for one square metre, the deciare is ten square metres. The are is a unit of area, equal to 100 square metres and it was defined by older forms of the metric system, but is now outside of the modern International System of Units. It is commonly used to measure real estate, in particular in Indonesia, India, and in French-, Portuguese-, Slovakian-, Serbian-, Czech-, Polish-, Dutch-, in Russia and other former Soviet Union states, the are is called sotka. It is used to describe the size of suburban dacha or allotment garden plots or small city parks where the hectare would be too large, the decare is derived from deka, the prefix for 10 and are, and is equal to 10 ares or 1000 square metres. It is used in Norway and in the former Ottoman areas of the Middle East, the hectare, although not strictly a unit of SI, is the only named unit of area that is accepted for use within the SI. The United Kingdom, United States, Burma, and to some extent Canada instead use the acre, others, such as South Africa, published conversion factors which were to be used particularly when preparing consolidation diagrams by compilation. In many countries, metrication redefined or clarified existing measures in terms of metric units, non-SI units accepted for use with the International System of Units
Hectare
–
Trafalgar Square has an area of about one hectare.
Hectare
–
Definition of a hectare and of an are.
Hectare
–
Waikato Stadium – Hamilton, New Zealand
Hectare
–
The Statue of Liberty –
New York Harbor
24.
Acre
–
The acre is a unit of land area used in the imperial and US customary systems. It is defined as the area of 1 chain by 1 furlong, lucia, St. Helena, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Turks and Caicos, the United Kingdom, the United States and the US Virgin Islands. The international symbol of the acre is ac, the most commonly used acre today is the international acre. In the United States both the international acre and the US survey acre are in use, but differ by two parts per million, see below. The most common use of the acre is to measure tracts of land, one international acre is defined as exactly 4,046.8564224 square metres. An acre was defined in the Middle Ages, being the amount of land that could be ploughed in one day with a yoke of oxen. One acre equals 0.0015625 square miles,4,840 square yards,43,560 square feet or about 4,047 square metres. While all modern variants of the acre contain 4,840 square yards, there are definitions of a yard. A square enclosing one acre is approximately 69.57 yards, as a unit of measure, an acre has no prescribed shape, any area of 43,560 square feet is an acre. In the international yard and pound agreement of 1959 the United States, consequently, the international acre is exactly 4,046.8564224 square metres. The US survey acre is about 4,046.872609874252 square metres, its value is based on an inch defined by 1 metre =39.37 inches exactly. Surveyors in the United States use both international and survey feet, and consequently, both varieties of acre. Since the difference between the US survey acre and international acre is only about a quarter of the size of an A4 sheet of paper, areas are seldom measured with sufficient accuracy for the different definitions to be detectable. In India, residential plots are measured in cents or decimal, in Sri Lanka the division of an acre into 160 perches or 4 roods is common. To be more exact, one acre is 90.75 percent of a 100 yards long by 53.33 yards wide American football field, the full field, including the end zones, covers approximately 1.32 acres. For residents of countries, the acre might be envisaged as approximately half of a 105 metres long by 68 metres wide association football pitch. It may also be remembered as 44,000 square feet, in English it was historically spelled aker. The acre was approximately the amount of land tillable by a yoke of oxen in one day and this explains one definition as the area of a rectangle with sides of length one chain and one furlong
Acre
–
Comparison of 1 Acre with some Imperial and metric units of area
25.
Suzhou gardens
–
The Classical Gardens of Suzhou are a group of gardens in Suzhou region, Jiangsu province which have been added to the UNESCO World Heritage List. According to UNESCO, the gardens of Suzhou represent the development of Chinese landscape garden design over more than two years, and they are the most refined form of garden art. These landscape gardens flourished in the mid-Ming to early-Qing dynasties, resulting in as much as 200 private gardens, today, there are 69 preserved gardens in Suzhou, and all of them are designated as protected National Heritage Sites. Famous Suzhou garden designers include Zhang Liang, Ji Cheng, Ge Yuliang, the site is monitored following a comprehensive monitoring plan and there is provision for both the routine maintenance and programmed conservation projects for all of the gardens. The Suzhou Municipal Administrative Bureau of Gardens is responsible for this, Chinese garden Classical Gardens of Suzhou - UNESCO World Heritage
Suzhou gardens
–
UNESCO World Heritage Site
Suzhou gardens
–
Humble Administrator's Garden (拙政园/拙政園; Zhuōzhèng Yuán)
Suzhou gardens
–
Lingering Garden (留园/留園; Liú Yuán)
Suzhou gardens
–
Master of the Nets Garden (网师园/網師園; Wǎngshī Yuán)
26.
Daoguang Emperor
–
The Daoguang Emperor was the eighth emperor of the Manchu-led Qing dynasty and the sixth Qing emperor to rule over China, from 1820 to 1850. His reign was marked by disaster and internal rebellion, that is, by the First Opium War. The Daoguang Emperor was born in the Forbidden City, Beijing and it was later changed to Minning when he became emperor, The first character of his private name was changed from Mian to Min to avoid the relatively common character Mian. Mianning was the son of Yongyan, the 15th son of the Qianlong Emperor. In 1796, Yongyan was enthroned as the Jiaqing Emperor, after which he made Lady Hitara his empress consort, Mianning was favoured by his grandfather, the Qianlong Emperor. He frequently accompanied his grandfather on hunting trips, on one such trip, at the age of nine, Mianning successfully hunted a deer, which greatly amused the Qianlong Emperor. In 1813, while he was still a prince, Mianning also played a role in repelling and killing White Lotus invaders who stormed the Forbidden City. This action earned him important merit in securing his claim to the later on. In September 1820, at the age of 38, Mianning inherited the throne after the Jiaqing Emperor died suddenly of unknown causes and he became the first Qing emperor who was the eldest legitimate son of his father. Now known as the Daoguang Emperor, he inherited an empire with Westerners encroaching upon the borders of China. The Daoguang Emperor had been ruling for six years when the heir to the Khojas, Jahangir Khoja. By the end of 1826, the former Qing cities of Kashgar, Yarkand, Khotan, after a friend betrayed him in March 1827, Khoja was sent to Beijing in an iron litter and subsequently executed, while the Qing Empire regained control of their lost territory. During the Daoguang Emperors reign, China experienced major problems with opium, Opium had started to trickle into China during the reign of the Yongzheng Emperor, but was limited to approximately 200 chests annually. By the time of the Qianlong era, this amount had increased to 1,000 chests,4,000 chests by the Jiaqing era and more than 30,000 chests during the Daoguang era. The Daoguang Emperor issued many imperial edicts banning opium in the 1820s and 1830s, which were carried out by Lin Zexu, Lin Zexus efforts to halt the spread of opium in China led directly to the First Opium War. With the development of the First Opium War, Lin Zexu was made a scapegoat, meanwhile, in the Himalayas, the Sikh Empire attempted an occupation of Tibet but was defeated in the Sino-Sikh war. On the coasts, technologically and militarily inferior to the European powers, in 1811, a clause sentencing Europeans to death for spreading Catholicism had been added to the statute called Prohibitions Concerning Sorcerers and Sorceresses in the Great Qing Code. The Daoguang Emperor granted the title of Wujing Boshi to the descendants of Ran Qiu, the Daoguang Emperor died on 25 February 1850 at the Old Summer Palace,8 km/5 miles northwest of Beijing
Daoguang Emperor
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Daoguang Emperor Doro Eldengge Han 道光帝 Төр Гэрэлт Хаан
Daoguang Emperor
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Portrait of the Emperor sitting with a book
Daoguang Emperor
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The Emperor is presented with prisoners of the campaign to pacify rebels in
Xinjiang at the Wu-men in 1828
Daoguang Emperor
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The Emperor with his empress, imperial consorts and children in a palace courtyard
27.
Rosewood
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Rosewood refers to any of a number of richly hued timbers, often brownish with darker veining but found in many different hues. All genuine rosewoods belong to the genus Dalbergia and it is best known as Brazilian Rosewood, but also as Bahia rosewood. This wood has a sweet smell, which persists for many years. Another classic rosewood comes from Dalbergia latifolia known as Indian rosewood or sonokeling and it is native to India and is also grown in plantations elsewhere in Pakistan. Madagascar rosewood, known as bois de rose, is prized for its red color. It is overexploited in the wild, despite a 2010 moratorium on trade and illegal logging, throughout southeast Asia Dalbergia oliveri is harvested for use in woodworking. It has a fragrant and dense grain near the core, however the outer sapwood is soft. Dalbergia cultrata that has variegated burgundy to light color, a blackwood timber is sold as Burmese Rosewood. Products built with rosewood based engineered woods are sold as Malaysian Rosewood or as Dalbergia oliveri, some rosewood comes from Dalbergia retusa, also known as the Nicaraguan rosewood or as palisander is controlled by CITES under Appendix 2 which allows some commercial activity. Several species are known as Guatemalan rosewood or Panama rosewood, D. tucerencis, D. tucarensis, stevensonii, also on CITES Appendix 2, is used for marimba keys, guitar parts, clarinets and other musical and ornamental applications. Not all species in the large genus Dalbergia yield rosewoods, only about a species do. The woods of some species in the genus Dalbergia are notable—even famous—woods in their own right, African blackwood, cocobolo, kingwood. The woods of some species are usable for tool handles at best. The timber trade will sell many timbers under the name due to some similarities. A fair number of these come from other legume genera. Another that may be found in market from Southeast Asia is Pterocarpus indicus, Dalbergia sissoo is timber from rosewood species from India and Bangladesh, usually known as Sheesham or North-Indian Rosewood. It is extremely dense and has mild rot resistance, but it is porous and its exterior is soft and it is used for making cabinets, flooring and carving. It is exported as quality veneers, due to its after work quality when sealed and dyed, it is often sold as genuine rosewood or as teak
Rosewood
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A classic rosewood surface
Rosewood
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Chess pieces in
Dalbergia latifolia rosewood
Rosewood
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Back of guitar made with East Indian rosewood
Rosewood
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A
Chinese Ming Dynasty compound
wardrobe made of 'huanghuali' rosewood, latter half of the 16th century.
28.
Xinye Village
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Xinye is a historic Chinese village in Daciyan Town, Jiande City, Zhejiang Province. Founded in the Southern Song Dynasty, Xinye is noted for its well-preserved Ming and Qing era architecture, Xinye is also known for holding ancestor worship ceremonies on the annual Shangsi Festival, an ancient tradition that is only practiced by a few communities in China today, including Xinye. In 2010 it was designated as a National Historic and Cultural Village of China, Xinye is located in western Zhejiang Province, in the southern part of Jiande bordering Lanxi. The village is governed by Daciyan town of Jiande city, which is in turn within the boundary of the provincial capital Hangzhou. Xinye is overlooked on the northwest by Mount Yuhua and Mount Daofeng, the main access road is National Highway 330,6 kilometers from the village. Xinye was founded in 1219 during the reign of Emperor Ningzong of the Southern Song Dynasty, Ye Kuns grandson Ye Kecheng expanded the village, building Xishan Ancestral Hall on the western hills, and Youxu Ancestral Hall at the center of the village. Most of the 3,900 villagers today are surnamed Ye and they are collectively called the Yuhua Ye Clan after the mountain overlooking the village. During the eighth generation the village was divided into subclans. There are now five subclans, Chongren, Chongzhi, Chongde, Chongyi, with 16 ancestral halls and 230 white-washed ancient residences that are well preserved, Xinye is acclaimed as the largest open-air museum of ancient residences in China. Its architectural style is similar to that of the nearby historical Huizhou region which includes World Heritage Sites Hongcun, Xishan is the oldest among Xinyes ancestral halls, and is now part of the Xinye Elementary School. Youxu remains the main ancestral hall where the most important ceremonies are held. Other major landmarks include the Ming Dynasty Tuanyun Pagoda and Wenchang Pavilion, also near the village is Daci Rock, a Buddhist temple built on a sheer mountain cliff dating from the Mongol Yuan Dynasty. The villages remote mountainous location and strong sense of clanship are the reasons for its excellent state of preservation. The main religious practice of the village is traditional ancestor worship, to that end, the village has maintained a detailed genealogy book through the centuries, which is officially updated once every sexagenary cycle, accompanied by a major ceremony. Shangsi Festival is an ancient tradition that is practiced by a few local communities in China today. The celebration includes a 3-kilometer ritual procession to Yuquan Temple and back, in 2010 Xinye was designated as a National Historic and Cultural Village of China, and it plans to eventually apply for World Heritage Site status together with nearby Zhuge and Yuyuan villages
Xinye Village
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Xinye village map
Xinye Village
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South Pond, with Mount Yuhua in the background
29.
Zhejiang
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Zhejiang, formerly romanized as Chekiang, is an eastern coastal province of China. The provinces name derives from the Zhe River, the name of the Qiantang River which flows past Hangzhou. Kuahuqiao culture was a neolithic culture that flourished in Hangzhou area in 6. Zhejiang was the site of the Neolithic cultures of the Hemudu, the area of modern Zhejiang was outside the major sphere of influence of the Shang civilization during the second millennium BC. Instead, this area was populated by peoples known as Dongyue. The kingdom of Yue began to appear in the chronicles and records written during the Spring, according to the chronicles, the kingdom of Yue was in northern Zhejiang. Shiji claims that its leaders were descended from the Shang founder Yu the Great, the Song of the Yue Boatman was transliterated into Chinese and recorded by authors in north China or inland China of Hebei and Henan around 528 BC. The song shows that the Yue people spoke a language that was mutually unintelligible with the dialects spoken in north, the Sword of Goujian bears bird-worm seal script. Yuenü was a swordswoman from the state of Yue, to check the growth of the kingdom of Wu, Chu pursued a policy of strengthening Yue. Under King Goujian, Yue recovered from its early reverses and fully annexed the lands of its rival in 473 BC, the Yue kings then moved their capital center from their original home around Mount Kuaiji in present-day Shaoxing to the former Wu capital at present-day Suzhou. With no southern power to turn against Yue, Chu opposed it directly and, in 333 BC, yues former lands were annexed by the Qin Empire in 222 BC and organized into a commandery named for Kuaiji in Zhejiang but initially headquartered in Wu in Jiangsu. Kuaiji Commandery was the power base for Xiang Liang and Xiang Yus rebellion against the Qin Empire which initially succeeded in restoring the kingdom of Chu. At the beginning of the Three Kingdoms era, Zhejiang was home to the warlords Yan Baihu and Wang Lang prior to their defeat by Sun Ce and Sun Quan, who eventually established the Kingdom of Wu. Despite the removal of their court from Kuaiji to Jianye, they continued development of the region, industrial kilns were established and trade reached as far as Manchuria and Funan. Zhejiang was part of the Wu during the Three Kingdoms, Wu, commonly known as Eastern Wu or Sun Wu, had been the economically most developed state among the Three Kingdoms. The historical novel Romance of the Three Kingdoms records that Zhejiang had the best-equipped, the story depicts how the states of Wei and Shu, lack of material resources, avoided direct confrontation with the Wu. In armed military conflicts with Wu, the two states relied intensively on tactics of camouflage and deception to steal Wus military resources including arrows and bows, the other two centers in the south were Jiankang and Chengdu. In 589, Qiantang was raised in status and renamed Hangzhou, some may have lost social privilege, and took refugee in areas south to Yangtze River
Zhejiang
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This tripod planter from the
Ming Dynasty was found in Zhejiang province. It is housed in the
Smithsonian in
Washington, D.C.
Zhejiang
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Map showing the location of Zhejiang Province
Zhejiang
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View of the
West Lake in
Hangzhou.
Zhejiang
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Temple of the
Chenghuangshen (City God) of
Hangzhou, by night, in Wushan,
Xihu.
30.
Koi
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Koi or more specifically nishikigoi, are ornamental varieties of domesticated common carp that are kept for decorative purposes in outdoor koi ponds or water gardens. Koi varieties are distinguished by coloration, patterning, and scalation, some of the major colors are white, black, red, yellow, blue, and cream. The most popular category of koi is the Gosanke, which is made up of the Kohaku, Taisho Sanshoku, carp are a large group of fish originally found in Central Europe and Asia. Various carp species were domesticated in East Asia, where they were used as food fish. Carp are coldwater fish, and their ability to survive and adapt to many climates and water allowed the domesticated species to be propagated to many new locations. Natural color mutations of these carp would have occurred across all populations, carp were first bred for color mutations in China more than a thousand years ago, where selective breeding of the Prussian carp led to the development of the goldfish. Members of the carp species complex were aquacultured as a food fish at least as long ago as the fifth century BC in China. Western Jin Dynasty mentioned carp with various colors, carp were bred for color in Japan in the 1820s, initially in the town of Ojiya in the Niigata prefecture on the northeastern coast of Honshu island. The outside world was not aware of the development of color variations in Japanese koi until 1914, from that time, interest in koi spread throughout Japan. From this original handful of koi, all other Nishikigoi varieties were bred, the hobby of keeping koi eventually spread worldwide. Koi are now sold in many pet shops, with higher-quality fish available from specialist dealers. Extensive hybridization between different populations coupled with widespread translocations have muddled the historical zoogeography of the common carp, traditionally, East Asian carp were included as a subspecies of the common carp under the scientific name C. carpio haematopterus. These differ in meristics from the common carp of Europe and Western Asia, leading recent authorities to recognize them as a separate species, C. rubrofuscus. Consequently, recent authorities have suggested that the species of the koi is C. rubrofuscus or at least an East Asian carp species instead of C. carpio. The word koi comes from Japanese, simply meaning carp and it includes both the dull grey fish and the brightly colored varieties. What are known as koi in English are referred to specifically as nishikigoi in Japan. In Japanese, koi is a homophone for another word that means affection or love, koi are therefore symbols of love, Koi varieties are distinguished by coloration, patterning, and scalation. Some of the colors are white, black, red, yellow, blue
Koi
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Koi
Koi
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Feeding the koi
Koi
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Koi have prominent
barbels on the lip that are not visible in goldfish.
Koi
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Koi in
Yu Garden,
Shanghai
