Ladies and gentlemen:
The Palace Museum is located in the center of Beijing. It is also known as the Forbidden City in the old days. Actually it was the imperial palace for the emperors and served as both living quarters and the venue of the state administration in the Ming and Qing dynasties. Its name, on the one hand, comes from ancient Chinese astronomers' belief that God's abode or the Purple Palace, the pivot of the celestial world, is located in the Pole Star, at the center of the heavens . Hence, as the Son of God, the emperor should live in the Purple City. On the other hand, except for palace maids, eunuchs and guards, ordinary the Forbidden City and the Purple City.
It took 14 years to complete the magnificent palace. Construction began in 1406 and finished in 1420. The following year, in 1421 the capital of the Ming Dynasty was moved from Nanjing to Beijing. Starting from the third emperor of the Ming Dynasty Zhu Di to the last emperor of the Qing Dynasty Pu Yi, altogether 24 emperors lived here for a total of 491 years. 14 of then were Ming emperors and 10 were Qing emperors.
The Forbidden City covers an area of 72 hectares with a total floor space of about 163,000 square meters. It is rectangular in shape, 960 meters long from north to south and 750 meters wide from east to west with a10-meter high city wall surrounded and encircled by a 52 meter-wide moat. At each corner of the surrounding wall, there is a magnificent watchtower which was heavily guarded in the old days.
The Forbidden City now consists of more than 90 palaces and courtyards, 980 buildings with rooms of 8,704. Most of the structures in the Forbidden City were made of wood with white marble, stone or brick foundations. The building materials were from parts of our country. The timber came from Sichuan, Guizhou, Guandxi, Hunan and Yunnan provinces in southwest China. But in the Qing Dynasty, the timbers were transported from northeast China. Other construction materials, including brick, stone and lime, were used by both Dynasties. The golden bricks that paved the halls were manufactured in Suzhou, refined bricks used to build the foundation of halls were made in Linqing, and lime came from Yizhou. White marble was provided regularly by Fangshan County and glazed tiles by Sanjiadian.
The Forbidden City can be divided into two parts: the Outer Court and the Inner Palace. The Outer Court consists of three main buildings where the emperors attended the grand of rear three main buildings and the six eastern palaces and six western palaces where the emperor used to handle daily affairs and the living quarters for the emperor, empress and imperial concubines to live in.
The Forbidden City is the best-preserved imperial palace in China and the largest ancient palatial structure in the world. In 1987 it was listed as the world cultural heritage by UNESCO.
The Meridian Gate is the main entrance to the Forbidden City. It is called Meridian Gate because the emperor believed that the meridian line went right through the Forbidden City and his imperial residence was the center of the whole universe. It is 35.6meters high with five towers on the top, so it is also nicknames as the “Five-Phoenix Tower.”
The Meridian Gate was the place to announce the new lunar year calendar on the first day of 10th lunar month every year. Lanterns would also be hung up on the Meridian Gate on the 15th day of the first lunar month during the Ming Dynasty, when all the officials would have a feast in the Forbidden City and ordinary citizens, when all the officials would have a fast in the Forbidden City and ordinary citizens would go to the Meridian Gate to look at the beautiful lanterns. When a general returned from battle, the ceremony of “Accepting Captives of War” was held here. The “Court Beating” also took place here.
The gate has five openings. The central passageway was for the emperor exclusively. But apart from the emperor, the empress could use the central passageway on the day of the imperial wedding ceremony. However, after the palace examination, the first top three outstanding scholars were allowed to go through the central gate. The high-ranking civil and military officials went in through the side gate on the east. The two smaller ones on both sides at the corner were for the lowranking officials. During the Palace Examination all the candidates went in from these two side-gates according to the odd number or even number.
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