Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) ContributionsDO NOT WRITE ON THIS PAGE
Forbidden City
On Tiananmen Square in the heart of China’s capital, Beijing, stands the Forbidden City. Once forbidden to the common people, it is now open as the Palace Museum. The place where 24 of the Ming and Qing emperors lived, it includes a maze of structures with golden-tiled roofs and dark red walls—the colors of the imperial court. In an area of 178 acres (72 hectares) is a complex of palaces, halls, and other buildings that constitutes the largest and most complete existing ensemble of traditional Chinese architecture. The complex was first built from 1406 to 1420, and it remained the seat of the Chinese emperors for nearly 500 years, until the dynastic system collapsed in 1911–12. Today, inside many of the buildings the Palace Museum displays valuable bronzes, pottery, paintings, jades, silks, jewels, furniture, and other objects from imperial China.
Surrounding the Forbidden City are walls some 35 feet (10 meters) high and a moat 171 feet (52 meters) wide. The complex has an Outer Court, where emperors held official audiences and government business was conducted, and an Inner Court, which served as living quarters for the imperial family.
The powerful emperor Yong Le was the first Chinese emperor to inhabit (live in) the city. He and his family lived within the city’s walls, and only top government officials were allowed to enter the city.
Twenty-four emperors (fourteen Ming Emperors and ten Qing Emperors) lived in the Forbidden City over a 500-year period. In 1987, the Forbidden City became a World Heritage Site, due to its significant place in the development of Chinese architecture and culture. The Forbidden City, the result of the two-thousand-year development of classical Chinese and East Asian architecture, has been influential in the later development of Chinese architecture, as well as providing inspiration for many artistic works.
Great Wall
One of the largest engineering and building projects ever carried out is the Great Wall of China. Originally a defensive system, it is today a major tourist attraction and a national symbol of China. The Great Wall is actually not one wall but many different walls built over time in northern China and southern Mongolia. Some of the walls run parallel to each other. The most extensive and best-preserved version of the wall extends for some 5,500 miles (8,850 kilometers), often tracing the crestlines of hills and mountains as it snakes across the countryside. It extends from Liaoning Province in the east to Gansu Province in the northwest. Roughly 70 percent of the total length is constructed wall. Most of the rest consists of natural barriers such as rivers and mountain ridges, and a small portion consists of ditches and moats.
The walls were built over two thousand years. Various northern states built defensive walls in the 7th to 4th centuries BC. The earliest major work on a unified system came during the Qin Dynasty. The first Qin emperor, Shihuangdi, united seven different states into one China in about 221 BC. He ordered that some of the existing sections of wall be connected to form one long wall along the northern frontier, to protect the empire against invasions by wandering tribes from the north, especially the Xiongnu. The project began in about 214 BC and lasted about 10 years. The work was done by hundreds of thousands of soldiers and laborers who were drafted for the project.
Since that time the wall has been extended and rebuilt many times, and sections of it have fallen apart or been destroyed. Most of the wall that exists today was built in the 15th and 16th centuries, during the Ming Dynasty, to protect against Mongolian invasions.
The wall is simple in structure. Different sections were built of dirt, stone, or brick, depending on the local availability of materials. The height of the wall ranges from 15 to 30 feet (5 to 9 meters), with towers rising at regular intervals above it. The towers were used as watchtowers and signal towers. The wall is 15 to 25 feet (5 to 8 meters) wide. Along the top of some sections runs a 13-foot- (4-meter-) wide roadway. At strategically important points were built fortresses, known as passes, and gates.
The wall’s use as a defensive barrier ended in 1644 with the collapse of the Ming Dynasty. Parts of the wall fell into disrepair, but in the 20th century it became a major world tourist destination and parts were restored. It was declared a World Heritage site in 1987. Most tourists visit the sections near Beijing, especially at Badaling to the northwest of the city.
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Sea Voyages
Early Ming Emperors wanted to know more about the world outside of China and to expand Chinese influence abroad. Ming Emperors built a large fleet of ships to sail to other countries. The ships, known as junks, usually traveled along the coast of China, or on the open seas. Between AD 1405 to 1433, Ming Emperors sent the Chinese fleet on seven overseas voyages. They wanted to trade with other kingdoms and demonstrate Chinese power. They also wanted to demand that weaker kingdoms pay tribute to China.
The leader of these journeys was a Chinese Muslim and admiral, Zheng He. The voyages of Zheng He were quite impressive. On the first voyage, nearly 28,000 men sailed on 62 large ships and 250 smaller ships. The largest ship was 440 feet long—more than five times longer than Christopher Columbus’s Santa Maria. Zheng He’s first fleet traveled to Southeast Asia. Later, he traveled to Western India and East Africa. At the different ports he visited, Zheng He traded Chinese goods, such as silk, paper, and porcelain. He returned with items unknown in China. For example, Zheng He brought giraffes and other animals from Africa, which fascinated Emperor Yong Le. These animals were placed in the Emperor’s Zoo in Beijing. Zheng He also brought visitors from the outside world to China. The voyages of Zheng He encouraged Chinese merchants to trade goods and settle in areas all over Southeast Asia and India. In these places, goods and cultures were exchanged. Furthermore, since Zheng He was Muslim, his travels and interactions with other cultures helped relations between China and the Islamic countries of western Asia. Editor’s note-Please share with students that the question of the length of Zheng He’s ships have been hotly debated by scholars. An increasing number of scholars now believe that the length of Zheng He’s longest ships was 200-250 feet still much bigger than Columbus’ ships but certainly not as long as for years scholars believed.
Isolationism
The word isolationism is defined as “a policy of remaining apart from the affairs or interests of other groups, especially the political affairs of other countries”. Simply stated, a country (such as China) becomes isolationist by keeping to themselves (not traveling and trading with other countries and cultures), and by trying to keep outside influences from getting in. After the famous voyager Zheng He died in 1433, China became a country that used the strategy of isolationism.
Despite the benefits of Zheng He’s travels (increased trade and the spread of Chinese culture), Chinese officials encouraged the idea of isolationism. They argued that Zheng He’s travels had cost too much, and the voyages had introduced unwanted foreign ideas. Some officials also believed that being a merchant was an unworthy and selfish occupation. A Confucian teaching said that people should place loyalty to society ahead of their own desires.
After Zheng He’s death, Confucian officials convinced the emperor to become isolationist. The Chinese voyaging fleet was fleet was taken apart, and the construction of seagoing vessels was stopped. As a result, China’s trade with other countries sharply declined. Within 50 years, Chinese shipbuilding technology became outdated.
China may also have become isolationist to keep away pirates who were attacking Chinese boats during the travels of Zheng He. China’s policy of isolationism had little effect on stopping pirate attacks, and isolationism hurt those merchants who had earned a living trading with other countries by sea. Many of these merchants left China to live in other countries in Southeast Asia that were not isolationist.
Isolationism had a profound (significant) impact on China and Chinese history. China had progressed rapidly throughout its 2000-year history, making major advancements, achievements, and inventions, and with the travels of Admiral Zheng He, it seemed China was prepared to become a global (world) power. However, when Chinese officials adopted the policy of isolationism, they closed off China from the rest of the world, and their progress slowed dramatically. In fact, when China removed its isolationist policy 500 years later (early 1900s), it was no longer one of the world’s most advanced societies. The isolationist return to Confucianism in the mid-1400s had caused its advanced society to stall in a rapidly changing world.
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