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Old Summer Palace
The Old Summer Palace, also known as Yuanmingyuan () or Yuanmingyuan Park, originally called the Imperial Gardens (), and sometimes called the Winter Palace, was a complex of palaces and gardens in present-day Haidian District, Beijing, China. It is northwest of the walls of the former Imperial City section of Beijing. Widely perceived as the pinnacle work of Chinese imperial garden and palace design, the Old Summer Palace was known for its extensive collection of gardens, its building architecture and numerous art and historical treasures. Constructed throughout the 18th and early 19th centuries, the Old Summer Palace was the main imperial residence of Qianlong Emperor of the Qing dynasty and his successors, and where they handled state affairs; the Forbidden City was used for formal ceremonies. It was reputed as the "Garden of Gardens" () in its heyday. During the Second Opium War, French and British troops captured the palace on 6 October 1860, looting and destroying th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Summer Palace
The Summer Palace () is a vast ensemble of lakes, gardens and palaces in Beijing. It was an imperial garden in the Qing dynasty. Inside includes Longevity Hill () Kunming Lake and Seventeen Hole Bridge. It covers an expanse of , three-quarters of which is water. Longevity Hill is about high and has many buildings positioned in sequence. The front hill is rich with splendid halls and pavilions, while the back hill, in sharp contrast, is quiet with natural beauty. The central Kunming Lake, covering , was entirely man-made and the excavated soil was used to build Longevity Hill. Inspired by the gardens in South China, in the Summer Palace there are over 3,000 various Chinese ancient buildings that house a collection of over 40,000 kinds of valuable historical relics from each dynasty. In December 1998, UNESCO included the Summer Palace on its World Heritage List. It declared the Summer Palace "a masterpiece of Chinese landscape garden design. The natural landscape of hills an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
UNESCO
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a List of specialized agencies of the United Nations, specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It has Member states of UNESCO, 193 member states and 12 associate members, as well as partners in the Non-governmental organization, non-governmental, Intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental and private sector. Headquartered at the World Heritage Centre in Paris, France, UNESCO has 53 regional field offices and 199 national commissions that facilitate its global mandate. UNESCO was founded in 1945 as the successor to the League of Nations's International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation.English summary). Its constitution establishes the agency's goals, governing structure, and operating framework. UNESCO's founding mission, which was shaped by the Second World War, is to adva ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hall Of Rectitude And Honor
In architecture, a hall is a relatively large space enclosed by a roof and walls. In the Iron Age and early Middle Ages in northern Europe, a mead hall was where a lord and his retainers ate and also slept. Later in the Middle Ages, the great hall was the largest room in castles and large houses, and where the servants usually slept. As more complex house plans developed, the hall remained a large room for dancing and large feasts, often still with servants sleeping there. It was usually immediately inside the main door. In modern British houses, an entrance hall next to the front door remains an indispensable feature, even if it is essentially merely a corridor. Today, the (entrance) hall of a house is the space next to the front door or vestibule leading to the rooms directly and/or indirectly. Where the hall inside the front door of a house is elongated, it may be called a passage, corridor (from Spanish ''corredor'' used in El Escorial and 100 years later in Castle ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Zodiac
The Chinese zodiac is a traditional classification scheme based on the lunar calendar that assigns an animal and its reputed attributes to each year in a repeating twelve-year cycle. Originating from China, the zodiac and its variations remain popular in many East Asian and Southeast Asian countries, such as Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Singapore, Nepal, Bhutan and Thailand. Identifying this scheme using the generic term "''zodiac''" reflects several superficial similarities to the Western zodiac: both have time cycles divided into twelve parts, each labels at least the majority of those parts with names of animals, and each is widely associated with a culture of ascribing a person's personality or events in their life to the supposed influence of the person's particular relationship to the cycle. Nevertheless, there are major differences between the two: the animals of the Chinese zodiac are not associated with constellations spanned by the ecliptic plane. The Chinese twelv ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Haiyantang
The Twelve Old Summer Palace bronze heads are a collection of bronze fountainheads in the shape of the Chinese zodiac animals that were part of a water clock fountain in front of the Haiyantang () building of the Xiyang Lou (Western style mansions) area of the Old Summer Palace in Beijing. Believed to have been designed by the Jesuit Giuseppe Castiglione for the Qianlong Emperor, the statues would spout out water from their mouths to tell the time.CSmonitor.com.CSmonitor.com" ''China protests Christie's auction in Paris of relics.'' Retrieved on 2009-02-20. The bronze-cast heads of the stone statues were among the treasures looted during the destruction of the Old Summer Palace by British and French expeditionary forces in 1860 during the Second Opium War.Wtop.com.Wtop.com" ''French judges allows auction of Chinese artifacts.'' Retrieved on 2009-02-20. Since then, they have been among the most visible examples of attempts to repatriate Chinese art and cultural artifacts. Two o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michel Benoist
Michel Benoist (, 8 October 1715 in Dijon, France – 23 October 1774 in Beijing, China) was a Jesuit scientist who served for thirty years in the court of the Qianlong Emperor (1735 - 1796) during the Qing Dynasty, known for his architectural and landscape designs of the Old Summer Palace (Yuanming Yuan). Along with Giuseppe Castiglione, Benoist served as one of two Jesuit advisors to the Qianlong Emperor, and transformed parts of the Old Summer Palace into what historian Mark Elliott calls an "imitation of Versailles or Fontainebleau." Early life Michel Benoist was born on 8 October 1715 in Dijon, France. The name Benoist is an archaic form of the name "Benoît," and both are used interchangeably in textual sources. Benoist studied in Dijon and at Saint Sulpice, Paris. He entered the Jesuit Novitiate at Nancy on 18 March 1737 and was formally ordained as a Jesuit priest in Trier in 1739. Shortly after, he left for Paris to study mathematics, astronomy, and hydraulic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Giuseppe Castiglione (Jesuit)
Giuseppe Castiglione, S.J. (; 19 July 1688 – 17 July 1766), was an Italian Jesuit brother and missionary in China, where he served as an artist at the imperial court of three Qing emperors – the Kangxi, Yongzheng and Qianlong emperors. He painted in a style that is a fusion of European and Chinese traditions. Early life Castiglione was born in Milan's San Marcellino district on 19 July 1688. He was educated at home with a private tutor, then a common practice among wealthy families. He also learned to paint under the guidance of a master. In 1707, he entered the Society of Jesus in Genoa aged 19. Although a Jesuit, he was never ordained as a priest, instead joining as a lay brother. Works Paintings In the late 17th century, a number of European Jesuit painters served in the Qing court of the Kangxi Emperor who was interested in employing European Jesuits trained in various fields, including painting. In the early 18th century, Jesuits in China made a request for a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jesuit
, image = Ihs-logo.svg , image_size = 175px , caption = ChristogramOfficial seal of the Jesuits , abbreviation = SJ , nickname = Jesuits , formation = , founders = , founding_location = , type = Order of clerics regular of pontifical right (for men) , headquarters = Generalate:Borgo S. Spirito 4, 00195 Roma-Prati, Italy , coords = , region_served = Worldwide , num_members = 14,839 members (includes 10,721 priests) as of 2020 , leader_title = Motto , leader_name = la, Ad Majorem Dei GloriamEnglish: ''For the Greater Glory of God'' , leader_title2 = Superior General , leader_name2 = Fr. Arturo Sosa, SJ , leader_title3 = Patron saints , leader_name3 = , leader_title4 = Ministry , leader_name4 = Missionary, educational, literary works , main_organ = La Civiltà Cattoli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xiyang Lou
Xiyang Lou (), are ruins of 18th-century European-style imperial buildings on the grounds of the Old Summer Palace in Beijing, China. They are located in the northern part of the ''Changchun Yuan'' (Garden of Eternal Spring), one of the three gardens which once made up the Old Summer Palace, and cover an area of about 7 hectares. History The Xiyang Lou were commissioned by the Qianlong Emperor and designed mainly by the Italian Jesuit Giuseppe Castiglione who was in his service as a court painter. Castiglione relied on the French Jesuit scientist Michel Benoist for the engineering tasks, in particular for the fountains, which were the chief interest of the emperor. Construction was carried out by Chinese craftsmen working under their supervision with some further contributions by other European artists, such as the German Ignaz Sichelbarth and the Florentine Bonaventura Moggi. Planning of the gardens started in 1747 and four years later in 1751, the first waterworks (Xieqiqu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ming Dynasty
The Ming dynasty (), officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties in Chinese history, imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1368 to 1644 following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming dynasty was the last orthodox dynasty of China ruled by the Han Chinese, Han people, the majority ethnic group in China. Although the primary capital of Beijing fell in 1644 to a rebellion led by Li Zicheng (who established the short-lived Shun dynasty), numerous rump state, rump regimes ruled by remnants of the House of Zhu, Ming imperial family—collectively called the Southern Ming—survived until 1662. The Ming dynasty's founder, the Hongwu Emperor (r. 1368–1398), attempted to create a society of self-sufficient rural communities ordered in a rigid, immobile system that would guarantee and support a permanent class of soldiers for his dynasty: the empire's standing army exceeded one million troops and the naval history of China, navy's dockyards in Nanjin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yuan Dynasty
The Yuan dynasty (), officially the Great Yuan (; xng, , , literally "Great Yuan State"), was a Mongol-led imperial dynasty of China and a successor state to the Mongol Empire after its division. It was established by Kublai, the fifth khagan-emperor of the Mongol Empire from the Borjigin clan, and lasted from 1271 to 1368. In orthodox Chinese historiography, the Yuan dynasty followed the Song dynasty and preceded the Ming dynasty. Although Genghis Khan had been enthroned with the Han-style title of Emperor in 1206 and the Mongol Empire had ruled territories including modern-day northern China for decades, it was not until 1271 that Kublai Khan officially proclaimed the dynasty in the traditional Han style, and the conquest was not complete until 1279 when the Southern Song dynasty was defeated in the Battle of Yamen. His realm was, by this point, isolated from the other Mongol-led khanates and controlled most of modern-day China and its surrounding areas, incl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jade Spring Hill
Jade Spring Hill () is located to the west of the Summer Palace in Beijing, China. It was also formerly known as Jingming Palace (景明宫, "Jǐngmíng gōng"). It contains an imperial garden, the Jingming Garden and is named after the Jade Spring. It is the location of the Xiangji Temple, the Yufeng Pagoda, the Jinxing Palace and the Furong Palace. Jade Spring Hill reportedly hosts the private villas of high ranking members of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s Central Military Commission (CMC) and People's Liberation Army (PLA). Entry is forbidden for non-residents and the area remains under tight security at all times. Jade Spring Hill has been called the "back garden" of Chinese politics (in contrast to the official political compound of Zhongnanhai) because so many influential leaders reportedly have residences in the area. Several of the most recent CCP general secretaries, including Jiang Zemin, Hu Jintao, and Xi Jinping reportedly have been assigned houses in Jad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
