Speaking of the Ming and Qing dynasties, the first thing that comes to mind is certainly the Forbidden City in Beijing, the Forbidden City in Beijing is magnificent, has long been one of the most famous palace buildings in China and the world, but the Ming and Qing dynasties on an imperial city? Of course not only, there are also the Forbidden City in Shenyang, Nanjing Forbidden City ruins, etc.. There are actually four imperial cities in the Ming and Qing dynasties. The Forbidden City in Nanjing is the imperial palace built by Zhu Yuanzhang, the ancestor of the Ming Dynasty, and is the blueprint for the Forbidden City in Beijing, the mother of the official architecture of the Ming and Qing dynasties. The Imperial Palace in Beijing was built by Ming Emperor Zhu Di after he moved the capital to Beijing. Shenyang Imperial Palace is the palace built by the Qing Emperor Nurhachi before he entered China. Then there is another one, that is the Ming Dynasty's founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang in his hometown of Fengyang built the Ming Zhongdu.
Ming Zhongdu is probably the most lost imperial city of the Ming and Qing dynasties, it is not in Beijing nor in Nanjing, but in a small county on the southern bank of the Huai River, it cost a lot of money to build, taking six years to model the Forbidden City in Nanjing, the palace is 120,000 square meters larger than the Forbidden City in Beijing, but eventually did not do a day palace, until the annihilation in the military, in modern times, but also along with the "four old broken In modern times, it was accompanied by the trumpet of "breaking the Four Olds", the demolition of the demolition, the smashing of the smashing, in addition to the remaining broken gates and a section of the wall, the palace has long become a phantom, the once magnificent palace into the strangers, overgrown with wild grass.
In 1369 A.D., the second year of Ming Hongwu, I am now standing on the land that opened a major founding project. At this time, the Ming Dynasty had just been established, the Ming Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang and the ministers to discuss the construction of the capital, proposed "Lin Hao before the river after the Huai, with the danger can be relied on, with water can be transported, I want to be the capital, how?" Most of the founding generals of the Ming Dynasty were from Huaixi, and they were willing to return to their hometowns, so the rulers and ministers immediately agreed that the capital palace should be built in the Yang of Phoenix Mountain, so Haozhou was changed to Fengyang.
In order to build this capital city in his hometown, Zhu Yuanzhang spared no blood. The Ming capital city was divided into inner, middle and outer cities, the outer city had a perimeter of 30 kilometres and opened nine gates; the middle was the imperial city, with a perimeter of 8 kilometres and four gates; the inner was the palace city, with a perimeter of 3.68 kilometres and four gates.
This important founding project mobilized materials from all over the country, and the timber used was not only requisitioned from the whole country but also imported in large quantities from subsidiary countries.
The walls were built on a foundation of white jade stone or stone strips, on top of which large city bricks were laid. The masonry was built with lime, tung oil and glutinous rice juice as slurry, and the key parts were even filled with pig iron in the hope that it would last for a thousand years.
Tens of thousands of craftsmen built one of the most magnificent royal buildings in China for this new dynasty, which, if it had survived, would have been no less than the Forbidden City in Beijing.
With more than 1.5 million artisans, civilians, convicts, immigrants and troops, Fengyang on the south bank of the Huai River became a huge construction site.
As you can imagine, it was a 13.5-kilometre central axis with the asymmetrical east-west corridor of a thousand steps to the left and right, the central civil and military offices such as the Central Secretariat Province and the Great Governor's Office, the Imperial Temple and the Social Temple, the Wenhua Hall and the Buying Hall, the Wenlou and the Wulou, the East Palace and the West Palace.
In front of the Daming Gate, on Yunji Street, to the east are arranged the City God Temple, the Golden Water Bridge, the State Children's Palace and the Drum Tower; to the west are arranged the Temple of Merit, the Golden Water Bridge, the Temple of the Emperors and the Bell Tower.
Enter the Daming Gate, walk along the imperial road after the wide convex square, into the Forbidden City Chengtianmen, through the Duanmen, across the Outer Five Dragons Bridge to the Imperial City Noon Gate.
Enter the Noon Gate, cross the Inner Five Dragons Bridge, and enter the Fengtian Gate to the Main Hall. The main hall is the center of the central axis, north into the harem, out of the Imperial City Xuanwu Gate, through the garden, over the top of the Phoenix Mountain, out of the forbidden wall of the North Gate, down the Phoenix Mountain, the path north directly to the North Gate of the Central Capital City.
Imperial City perimeter of nine miles, open four doors: South for the Chengtian Gate, East for the East Security Gate, West for the Xi'an Gate, North Security Gate. Forbidden City perimeter of seven miles, open four doors: South for the Wu Gate, East for the East China Gate, West for the West China Gate, North for the Xuanwu Gate.
Today, the eyes are empty, more than 650 years have passed, everything has gone up in smoke, dust to dust to earth, the abrupt walls enclose a wasteland, telling the glory of the Ming Dynasty.
Probably whether presiding over the entire project of the Ming Dynasty's first minister Li Shanchang, or the millions of artisans, civilian workers, who would not expect that their hard work to build a magnificent project, not only did not do a day palace, and eventually became a vegetable field.
Built a full six years, are close to the completion of the Ming capital, why will suddenly stop it, "Ming Taizu actual record" recorded the reason for the strike is: "At the beginning, on the system as Zhou, Han camp built two capital, to be labor costs to strike." So the reason given in Ming history for the stoppage is "labor cost", that is, too costly, but the money should be spent are almost spent, stopping the work is not more wasteful?
In fact, there are two main reasons, one is the beginning of the country, a hundred wastes to be revived, but opened a huge construction project, the situation is a bit and the Qin Shi Huang repair Great Wall, the craftsmen were oppressed, launched a struggle, someone with paper puppets and other things, placed on the ridge, a curse, Zhu Yuanzhang angry will kill the craftsmen only a thousand people. And as a superstitious founding emperor, the "press town incident" caused a great psychological shadow to Zhu Yuanzhang.
The second is the original intention of building the Ming capital is and the founding fathers of the Ming dynasty to return home, but the later thing we all know, Zhu Yuanzhang suspicion more and more heavy, the old people of Huaixi deeper and deeper suspicion, most of the founding fathers finally fell a good death, the good intention of returning home, of course, also became a bubble.
After the construction of the capital stopped, it was not used as the capital later and was designated as the accompanying capital of the Ming Dynasty. The royal family often practised and trained in Fengyang, and lived in the capital city, but later, as Zhu Di moved the capital to Beijing, which was far away from Fengyang, the palace gradually fell into disuse.
What is left of the Ming capital today? The ruins of the Wu Gate, Xihuamen and Donghuamen remain, as well as a section of the city wall of about one kilometre. The base of the Drum Tower remains as an accessory building, and the Drum Tower has been rebuilt and the Bell Tower has been reconstructed.
If you come 5 years earlier, you can still see the very vicissitudes of Ming Zhongdu. Over the years, the city gates and walls have been partially restored, and the once dilapidated Xihuamen has been repaired, but there is always something missing.
Outside the Xihuamen Gate, a large area of lavender are opening, and many of those who enjoy the flowers may not know that there was once a building similar to the Forbidden City in Beijing.
What is left of the former imperial capital of the Ming Dynasty, other than the Imperial City of the Ming Dynasty?
The base of the Drum Tower of the Ming Dynasty is 72 meters long from north to south, 34.25 meters wide from east to west, and 15.8 meters high, which is the largest surviving Drum Tower in China. This Drum Tower in the small county is even more magnificent than the famous Xi'an Drum Tower.
Above the doorway in the middle is the four characters "Fundamental to the World" inscribed in the regular script by Zhu Yuanzhang himself.
Six miles to the west of the Drum Tower, there used to be an old bell tower, which was completely destroyed and then rebuilt in 2017.
"It was a good place, but since the birth of Emperor Zhu, there have been nine years of desolation in ten years. The construction of the Ming Zhongdu made Fengyang County a large city of more than 100,000 people, but with the political neglect of the Ming Zhongdu, the economy also began to depress, resulting in a large population loss. A large number of people who migrated due to the construction of the central capital were forced to sing flower drums and flee for their lives due to the depression and decay of the central capital and the lack of food. By the end of the Ming Dynasty, the peasant army captured the capital, after a fire, the capital completely decayed to the Qing Dynasty, the rivers and mountains changed hands, Fengyang completely lost the name of the accompanying capital, and turned back to the original the small county, to this day, Fengyang is still a small county under Chuzhou.
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