Pages Navigation Menu

THE FORBIDDEN CITY

THE FORBIDDEN CITY

THE FORBIDDEN CITY

Of all the palace ensembles that have been preserved to this day one can lawfully consider the most grandiose the purple Forbidden City in Beijing. The Forbidden City is more often called Gugong, which is translated from Chinese as “the ancient palace.”

The erecting of the Forbidden City began in 1407 on Emperor Zhu Di order; having occupied the emperor’s throne Zhu Di right away decided to move the capital of China from Nanjing to Beijing. About one million workers and one hundred masters were involved in the construction of the palace complex, and by 1420 the construction was finished. Gugong became a real fortress of the ancient emperor. During the construction and planning of the Forbidden City, all the requirements of Feng shui were met.

However, the emperor and his court moved to their residence only in 1421.

In the built palace complex 24 emperors (14 emperors of the Ming dynasty and 10 — of the Qing dynasty) lived and for 500 years ruled the country from here. The last emperor abandoned the Forbidden City in 1924, and the palace ensemble became a national museum the next year.

The Forbidden City is a square 960 meters long, 750 meters wide, occupying the space of 72 ha stretching from south to north. Several gates lead into the Forbidden City. The Meridian Gates are located in the south; the gates of Military Valor — in the north; the Western Flower Gates — in the west; and the Eastern Flower Gates — in the east.

The Forbidden City is surrounded by a high wall (10 meters high and 3.4 kilometers long) with 4 towers at the corners and a ditch filled with water.

In the Forbidden City there are splendid palaces, wide squares and luxurious facilities for empresses and concubines as well as the emperor’s garden and the center of the state administration.

The Forbidden City is of two parts, the front one and the inner one. In the front part there are three main palaces, Palace of Supreme Harmony (Taihedjan), Palace of Complete Harmony (Junhedjan) and Palace of Preserving Harmony (Baoheadjan). On the both sides Palace of Outstanding scientists and Palace of Military Valor are located. Processions and ceremonies were held here. High officials used to come here with their congratulations and honored the emperor, while the latter held feasts for them.

In the inner part of the Forbidden City, the Palace of the Heavenly Purity is located (Tsianjingun), Chamber of Prosperity and Longevity (Tsiaotaidian) and Palace of the Empress’ Patience (Kunjningun). From here the emperor ruled his country and here he lived.

North of the Palace of the Empress’ Patience there is the Emperor’s Garden that stands out by the exquisiteness of pine trees and cypresses growing there, beauty of benches and chambers as well as a wonderful pool with exotic stones.

On the both sides of these two palaces, in the east and west six separate palaces are located, in which concubines lived. Each palace has two small yards. The front yard was for receiving guests, and the rear (western) one was for bedrooms and auxiliary facilities. South of the six western palaces is Palace Yansindian, in which the emperor took care of the state affairs. South of the six eastern palaces is Jaigun Palace (palace for keeping the fast). Behind the eastern and western palaces there are chambers for emperor’s sons. West of the six western palaces there are living quarters for the empress and emperor’s concubines. East of the six western palaces is the architectural ensemble built for emperor of the Qing Dynasty Qianlong at the time when he was passing the throne over to his successor.

If one looks at the Forbidden City from high one can see yellow roofs and red walls. Yellow and red colors became the main colors of the emperor’s palace for a reason. Yellow is the clearest of all known colors, the color of the earth — the most important of five prime elements. The earth signifies the center of creation, and its color symbolizes the highest position only the emperor could have. That is why the roofs of the Forbidden City are yellow; and not just yellow but made of yellow tile work — that is, of yellow earth itself.

But in the Forbidden City there are buildings with black roofs as well. The emperor’s library is covered with a black roof. Black is the color of water that defeats fire; therefore, the black roof of the book depot was supposed to protect manuscripts and incunabula.

Numbers play an important role in the symbolism of the palace. Number nine is considered to be the emperor’s number for a special reason. It has the biggest significance in the number of figures before they surpass a decimal. Nine in Chinese sounds very much like the word “eternal.” The emperor is the first important thing in the world after heaven, the number of which is ten.

In the Forbidden City one meets with number nine everywhere. Count, for example, the number of golden rivets on the doors of the emperor’s bedroom. Horizontally there are nine of them; vertically — nine; diagonally — also nine.

Do you know, by the way, how many rooms there must be in the Forbidden City? You are right! Nine thousand nine hundred ninety nine and half rooms! And this is the reason why. Emperor Zhu Di had a strong desire to have ten thousand rooms in his palace. But as soon as he gave a commission to his architects he had a nightmare in his sleep. In his dream he saw the outraged Jade Emperor rampantly spitting out saliva. In the palace of the Jade Emperor there were ten thousand rooms. To build as many rooms for an earthly being — even though he was an emperor — is unthinkable. Mortals during their lifetime cannot cross over the line separating nine from ten, earth from heaven.

As he woke up in cold sweat, emperor Zhu Di commissioned his architects to design for him a palace that would have nine thousand nine hundred and ninety nine and half rooms. But, in fact, the emperor’s architects turned out to be crooks. The palace they built consists of 980 palace constructions with 8,728 rooms in them. And the famous “half” really exists in the emperor’s library.

While in the Forbidden City and touring the emperor’s library, I saw this “half-room” and could not understand why that room is considered to be a half. It turns out that at the time of the building of the Forbidden City there was a State Standard, according to which, a facility with sides longer than three meters were considered to be rooms, while the size of the “half-room” was only 1.5 meters! That explains it!

Another characteristic of the constructions of the Forbidden City is its roofs, to be precise — corners of these roofs. On the corners of the roofs one can see numerous mythical creatures. Actually, on the eaves of the roofs eleven figures stand — Guardians of the emperor’s palace. In the front there is the Immortal One on a Phoenix showing the way. He is followed by a dragon, a phoenix, a lion, a horse, a seahorse and other fierce animals: suaniy, yauyi, syaji, hounyu and hanji. In ancient China the number of animals on the roof determined status of the building. The more animals, the more important the building was.

Behind the Palace of Preserving Harmony in the center of the staircase my attention was drawn to a sculptural composition cut of stone monolith depicting nine dragons flying in the sky and playing with pearls. Even though there are many compositions showing dragons in the Forbidden City this one, as it turned out, is the biggest. It is more than 16 meters long, 3 meters wide and weighs around 250 tons.

As I was passing by the composition with dragons I kept thinking why emperors loved to depict dragons and not, let us say, lions.

Just like other nations of the world, the Chinese have their good and bad signs and premonitions. Trying to guard themselves from bad luck people surrounded themselves with items that, according to tradition, bring good fortune and tried to escape all things that can serve as an evil premonition. Some words, expressions, numbers and objects subjectively have good or bad significance. These beliefs still show in some rules, good manners and folk craftsmen’s produce of art. Knowledge of this kind of signs is necessary for a better understanding of Chinese traditional culture.

Of numerous items of positive significance the mythical image of a dragon is in the first place. While in some European countries dragon is depicted as an evil and ugly monster, according to Chinese tradition, it is a kind being ready to come to man’s rescue. Its image emerged based upon the totem of a dragon that is considered to be the Chinese nation’s patron. To emphasize dragon’s status of a creature surpassing in its might all the other creatures, the Chinese added to it the characteristics taken from a number of other animals: dragon has antlers of a deer, head of a horse, eyes of a hare, neck of a snake, stomach of a lizard, nails of an eagle, feet of a tiger, ears of a mouse, and its body is covered with scales of a fish.

The ancient Chinese attributed to dragons the ability to fly in the sky and penetrate into the earth, to rule over the clouds and cause rain. That is why from of old there used to be temples and idol shrines dedicated to dragons where people prayed for rain and a good harvest. Under the Hun dynasty the image of a dragon, a golden dragon in particular, started to be used as a symbol of the emperor’s authority. Later on, all the Chinese emperors spoke of themselves as of either incarnations of a dragon, or rulers patronized by a dragon. In this way they strove to exalt themselves over ordinary mortals and to strengthen their power. All the items designated for emperors’ usage were from then on decorated with the image of a dragon or a corresponding ornament. At the same time it was strictly forbidden for anybody except the emperor to use the ornament with a dragon for decoration of clothes, chairs etc. But the cult of dragon as a personification of a good sign was in no way uprooted among the ordinary people; handcrafts and architectural buildings were decorated with its image. Dragon was a character in oral folk lore fables. When people used it, they just tried in these cases to give their dragons an appearance and coloring different from the dragon of the emperors. Until this day traditions have been preserved to have racing of dragon-shaped boats, dragon dancing and so forth.

The image of a dragon is still widely used to decorate handcrafts of art. Of course, dragon today lost its totem’s mystery and political flavor, but the symbolism has been preserved, according to which it is believed to personify the Chinese nation; the Chinese love to call themselves “heirs of the dragon.” Such is the history of the Chinese dragon.

Leave a Comment

Яндекс.Метрика Индекс цитирования