The Imperial Palace watchtower

Forbidden City turret

synonym

The Imperial Palace turret generally refers to the Forbidden City turret

Located in Beijing, the Forbidden City turret is a multi angle building with a convex shape on all sides. The roof has three floors. The upper floor is a vertical and horizontal hilltop. It is composed of a suspended hilltop with two flowing slopes and a veranda on all sides. Because there are nine main ridges on the roof, it is called the nine ridge hall. The middle layer adopts the method of linking up, and the roof of the center is arched by the top of Xieshan mountain, which is surrounded by buildings on all sides, just like the stars and the moon. The lower eaves are the waist eaves of a ring half slope roof, so that the five roofs of the upper two floors form a composite whole. With exquisite architectural structure and exquisite architectural art, the turret has become the symbol of the Forbidden City because of its harmonious proportion, beautiful eaves and corners, and exquisite shape, which makes people marvel, admire and admire.

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brief introduction

In the Forbidden City, there are four gates, the Meridian Gate in the south, the Donghua gate, the Xihua gate and the Shenwu gate in the north. The whole palace is rectangular, covering an area of 720000 square meters. There are more than 70 large and small palaces, and more than 9000 houses. It is surrounded by a city wall more than 10 meters high and a moat more than 50 meters wide These exquisite and colorful turrets, built in the Ming Dynasty, have a history of more than 560 years. The plane layout of the turrets is in the form of two "ten" overlapped curvilinear rulers, surrounded by white jade column bases. The double eaves are of surface shape, with many corners crisscross. The upper eaves are composed of four corners, a sharp top and a Xieshan peak. There are bright mountains on all sides, crisscross ridges, and a bronze gilded top in Zhong'an The design of the turret is harmonious in proportion, ingenious in handling, complex in size and structure, and unique in style.

Architectural appearance

The shape of the turret is strange and colorful. It has a cross shaped ridge, three layers of double eaves, and many corners. The large wooden frame and the bucket arch are very complex. After careful measurement and research, the personnel concerned realized the wonderful rule. After the repair, the northwest turret of the Forbidden City has taken on a new look. The color is harmonious. The yellow glazed tile top and gilt top are shining in the sun, setting off the blue sky and white clouds It must be solemn and beautiful

Architectural features

The method of reducing columns is adopted in the corner building, and four columns are subtracted in the room to expand the space area. In the housing framework, the grilled beam method is adopted, and the beam head under the eaves is not exposed, which makes the appearance more prominent decorative effect.

The turret is located above xumizuo, surrounded by stone railings. In the middle, there are three square pavilions with a width of 8.73m on each side and one Baoxia on each side. It is close to the outer side of the city wall, and the terrain on both sides is limited. Therefore, the depth of Baoxia is only 1.60m, while the terrain on the inner side of the city wall is relatively open. The depth of Baoxia is increased to 3.98M, and the plane becomes a cross shape with the midpoint crossing. It contains the idea of Quchi tower, which makes the two different buildings, the turret and the city wall Form, has made an organic connection.

The turret is 27.50m high from the ground under the pier and abutment to the top of the turret. It is a compound roof composed of several Xieshan styles, covered with yellow glazed tiles, with nine beams, eighteen columns and 72 ridges. The upper eaves are the top of Xieshan, which is crisscrossed with the mountains on all sides, and the main ridge is crossed with the gold-plated copper crown. Under the eaves, there are seven Dougong. On the fourth side of the eaves of the second floor, there is a Xieshan style building. On the fourth corner, there is a vertical ridge. The multi angles are overlapped and linked with each other. Under the eaves, there are five Dougong. The lower eaves are surrounded by half slope waist eaves, with vertical ridges at the four corners and continuous ridges. Under the eaves, there are five Dougong. The lower eaves and the second eaves are actually a roof form with a double eaves on each side and a ridge on the top of the hill. The LiangFang of the turret is decorated with long JinFang heart ink line, large dot gold spiral pattern color painting, three cross six water caltrop flowers, and the door and window are extremely exquisite.

The four turrets in the Forbidden City are elegant in outline, unique in shape, exquisite and gorgeous, and the overhanging eaves are magnificent. As a matter of fact, the turret is not a real building. From the outside, the triple eaves are stacked in layers, with 28 wing angles, 16 nest angles, 28 nest angle ditches, 10 mountain flowers and 72 ridges. But when you enter the turret, you will find that the house is clean and tidy. There is not a single column on the ground, not to mention stairs and floors. It is probably called the turret because it is built on the city wall.

Legends and anecdotes

At each of the four corners of the Forbidden City, there is a turret with nine beams, eighteen columns and seventy-two ridges. It's beautiful. How are the four corners built?

There is a legend in Beijing that after Zhu Di, the king of Yan of the Ming Dynasty, became Emperor Yongle in Nanjing, he wanted to move his capital to Beijing because Beijing was his old place when he was king, so he sent his trusted ministers to build a palace in Beijing. Zhu Di told the Minister: four beautiful turrets should be built on the four horns of the Forbidden City, the outer wall of the palace. Each turret should have nine beams, eighteen columns and seventy-two ridges. And said: "you do this foreman minister, if the repair is not good, is to kill the head!" After receiving the emperor's edict, the foreman was very worried about how to build the turret with nine beams, eighteen columns and seventy-two ridges.

When the foreman arrived in Beijing, he called all the foremen and carpenters from 81 big packing factories and told them the emperor's will. The deadline was three months. He told them that they must build these four strange looking turrets on time and said, "if they can't, the emperor will kill my head naturally. But before I kill my head, I'll cut your head off, so I'll be the first one Mind your head Foremen and carpenters are not sure about such projects, so they often have to work together to figure out ways.

The time limit of three months is very short. In a twinkling of an eye, it's one month. The foremen and carpenters haven't come up with any clue or method. They have made many models, which are not suitable. At this time, it was the dog days in June and July. It was so hot that people couldn't breathe. In addition, they were very upset. The foreman and the carpenters were not suitable to sit or lie down. There is such a carpenter, really can not stay, on the street leisurely walk.

As we walked, we heard a loud cry from a long distance, and then we heard a cry: "buy a oyster, listen to it, you can't sleep, you can't get rid of it!" A closer look, is an old man carrying a lot of big and small sorghum straw woven cage, peddling along the street. One of them is a cage with a thin sorghum stalk. It's as delicate as a pavilion in the picture. There are some crabs in it. The carpenter thought: it's a bother anyway. He can't live. It's interesting to buy a nice cage, so he bought it.

The carpenter returned to the construction site with the cage. Everyone yelled: "people are very upset. How can you buy a cage to quarrel with others?" The carpenter said with a smile, "you can't sleep. You see." He wanted to say, look how beautiful the cage is! But before he said anything, he thought the cage was a little special. He quickly waved his hands and said, "don't make any noise. Let me count. "He carefully counted the beams, columns and ridges of the cage over and over again. Everyone was attracted by his number and looked at it quietly without a sound.

After counting the cage, the carpenter jumped up and patted his thigh and said, "isn't this the 72 ridges of nine beams and eighteen columns?" Everyone was happy when they heard that. This one took the cage count, and the other one took the cage count. They all said, "it's really a pavilion with nine beams and eighteen columns and seventy-two ridges."

Inspired by this cage, we figured out the shape of the Forbidden City's turret, ironed the pulp to make the shape, and finally built the existing turret.

Building use

The turret above the four corners of the Forbidden City Wall was built in 1420 and rebuilt in the Qing Dynasty. The turret is a part of the Forbidden City. It belongs to the defense facilities of the Imperial Palace together with the city wall, the gate tower and the moat. The Forbidden City turret is located 3 kilometers southwest of Yongding gate. It is a convenient door outside the ninth gate of the ancient South Garden, specially designed for the tenants nearby to enter and leave the garden. Jiaobao village in the west of the village is the northwest corner of Nanyuan wall at that time. Different from the nine gates (such as the south gate and the North Gate) where the emperor went in and out, the corner gate had only one small gate and one value difference room. The place names of Jiaomen and Jiaobao are a sign of the enclosure of Nanyuan.

Address: the Palace Museum, Dongcheng District, Beijing

Longitude: 116.39149803668

Latitude: 39.92290775994

Chinese PinYin : Gu Gong Jiao Lou