Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
not talk too much here.
3
As for the fact that there is no gate right in the center of the
north city wall is concerned, it is against the traditional regulations of the Way the
Craftsmen Build the City-state, hence a very unique issue worth attention.
Actually, it is due to the very fact that the north gate was deliberately omitted that
the middle axis running from north to south, which was the basis for the design of
the whole city, taking the 'Central Terrace' of the whole city as the starting point,
only streched to the south. Just under such circumstances, when the Yuan Dadu was
rebuilt at the early years of the Ming Dynasty, it was further extended southward
along the original middle axis on the basis of reducing the northern city fi rst, and
the Wansui Hill (now the Coal Hill) was piled up in place of the original 'Central
Terrace' as the symbol of center for designing the new city. At the same time, on the
due south of Wansui Hill, the Imperial Palace, now the Forbidden City, was
constructed along the middle axis.
Besides this, the Imperial Ancestral Temple in the east part and the Altar of Land
and Grain in the west part of the Yuan Dadu were respectively moved to the east and
west sides of the due south part of the Forbidden City, which was still fi t for the
ancient system of
zuozu youshe, mianchao houshi
. Then the newly built six big halls
on the middle axis inside the Forbidden City further embodied the traditional sys-
tem of Facing the South to be Emperor (Fig.
3.4
).
4
After the completion of the Yuan Dadu, the middle axis of the whole city kept
extending towards the south suburb again in accordance with the tradition of Praying
to the Heaven in the South Suburb (
jitian yu nanjiao
). After crossing a small river
which fl ew from west to east, the axis had two imperial building complexes sepa-
rately built on the east side and west side, Temple of Heaven on the east and Altar
of Mountain and River (now the Xian Nong Tan) on the west. After that, the city
walls on three sides, east, west and south, were built, enclosing these two important
complexes inside the city walls, as a result of which, Beijing started having inner
and outer parts.
From that onwards, Beijing City, the combination of inner and outer parts,
became the last built capital city in the times of the ruling of imperial power.
It further embodied the thought 'Facing the South to be Emperor' in the tradi-
tional ideology, and was preserved intact until the birth of New China in 1949
(see Fig.
3.4
).
Now only after having the full knowledge of the theme which is embodied in
concentration in the original planning and construction of Beijing City, can we
really learn that today the creation of the northern extension line of the middle axis
of the whole city and the further construction of public architectural complex at the
north point thereof, which 'outstandingly embodies the new style and features of the
capital in the 21st century', are of epoch-making signifi cance.
3
Hou Renzhi, “On the Transformation of the Beijing Old City,”
City Planning
(in Chinese),
1983, no. 1.
4
Hou Renzhi, “Inheritance and Development of Design and Planning in Forbidden City”,
Chinese
Studies
(in Chinese), vol. 1, 1993.
