明代陵墓建筑文化论文(英文)

1、ExplainhowtheChineseduringtheMingdynastycommemorateddeathinthemonumentalexpressionoftheirtombswithintheurbanandnaturalcontextsofBeijing.MakespecificreferencestotheirspatialrelationshipswiththeForbiddenCityandtheAltarofHeaven. 1. Introduction At the beginning of the primitive society, when people die

2、d, they were just buried randomly, and some were even discarded without burying. With the development of human society and the existence of religious superstition, commemoratingdeath inthemonumentalexpressionoftheirtombshad gradually developed into a major issue. Burial culture in ancient China has

3、a long history and profound content, especially the emperor mausoleums. As the emperor had the supreme social status, and ancient people praised highly of the patriarchal Confucianism, pursued grave burglar-proof and long-lasting, paid attention to Fengshui, all of these factors made the constructio

4、n scale of emperors tombs so grand and mysterious. Therefore, the ancient emperors mausoleums are not only the highest form of burial ritual, but also a comprehensive reflection the political system, custom, architecture, art and so on. (Ju, 2004) The scratch able latex grave (Jiugong) was used to b

5、ury the dead. The Ming dynasty is a significant dynasty in recent ancient in China, its emperor mausoleum system serve as a link between past and future exploring in this field is of great importance to study Chinas ancient mausoleum system. This paper will take the Ding Ling Tomb (tomb of Emperor W

6、anli of the Ming Dynasty) as an example to explainhowtheChineseduringtheMingdynastycommemorateddeathinthemonumentalexpressionofthetombswithintheurbanandnaturalcontextsofBeijing.Besides that the paper will also makespecificreferencestotheirspatialrelationshipswiththeForbiddenCityandtheAltarofHeaven.2

7、. Monumental expressions of Ming tombs in Beijing The Forbidden City in Beijing was the working and living place of the royal families of Ming and Qing dynasties. It is a range of palace groups established since 1407 to 1420. In accordance with the traditional Chinese Fengshui, using astrology to di

8、vide the orientation of the earth, Beijing is just located in the northeast, which is the projection of the North Star on the earth. The Forbidden City is both the center of the earth in geography and astronomy, the Taihe Palace built on the central axis even becomes the middest of the world such ha

9、s the worlds most distinguished position. (Antoniou, 2001) The overall architectural composition of the imperial palace is symmetric. Each building spreads to the central axis from south to north. The hugest Taihe Palace is at the very center, then the other palaces stretch from the south to the nor

10、th along the north-south axis. (Paludan, 1991)TheAltarofHeaven is located at the southeast of the Forbidden City and covers an area of 273 hectares. TheAltarofHeaven is located in the southeast of Beijing outer urban, the south of the imperial palace and the east side out of ZhengYangMen. It was set

11、 up since 1420 and becomes the ritual place for the ancient Chinese emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties. (Barm& Barm, 2012) It has created a symbolic link to strengthen the Confucius social hierarchy system. The temple architectural layout is like 回. The two altar walls are divided into the inne

12、r and outer part. The outer Altar wall has a total length of 6416 meters, while the inner wall has a length of 3292 meters. The very southern wall looks like a square which is a symbol of the earth. The very northern wall is like a semi-circle, which symbolizes the sky. (Meyer, 1978) The northern pa

13、rt is higher while the southern part is lower that represents the higher sky and lower earth, as well as the orbicular sky and rectangular earth. The main buildings of the temple focus at the northern and southern sides of the central axis, connected by the broad Danbi Bridge in the middle. From sou

14、th to north, there are Huanqiu Arch, Huangqiong Altar, Qinian Palace and so on. Besides that, there are also some other buildings and places such as the Imperial Kitchen, Slaughter Pavilion and the Hall of Abstinence. All of the architectures were well designed with harmonious color and advanced con

15、struction technique. (Goloany, 1989)Evolution and development of the mausoleum system in the Ming dynasty were influenced much by several traditional concepts such as Abiding by the progenitor system and Modeling after deceased king. The Five rooms layout of the Ding Ling Tomb is a expression of the

16、 scratchable latex style, also known as the mining field style, which is just coincident with the spatial layout of architectures intheForbiddenCityandtheAltarofHeaven. Specifically, the front, middle and rear chamber stand in the middle, which are of the same placement as the Qingqing Palace, Jiaot

17、ai Palace and Kunning Palace in the Forbidden City. The left and right room form a symmetrical distribution next to the middle chamber, which also have the same layout as the six eastern and western palaces located beside the Jiaotai Palace. The feature of Ding Ling Tomb is undoubtedly the core of C

18、hinese ancient funeral system, which is the embodiment of the Confucian idea” Death is just like the birth”. In addition, according to the literature records, such as The Memoir of Ming Dynasty, the Xuan Palace system was also planned, designed and constructed according to the building layout of the

19、 Forbidden City where the Ming dynasty emperors lived before death. The typical examples are the Chang Ling Tomb and Yong Ling Tomb. Under the theory of Fengshui, the underground architectures of the Ming Tombs in Beijing contain the same palace like the owner lived alive. While the above ground arc

20、hitectures integrate with the surrounding landscape perfectly, which reflect the traditional Chinese cosmology of orbicular sky and rectangular earth, just like the layout of theAltarofHeaven. As a result, the Fengshui of the Ming Tombs in Beijing and the placement of the tombs are just the reflecti

21、on of theForbiddenCityandtheAltarofHeaven. (Gillman, 1983)The scratchable latex chamber and underground Xuan Palace equipped with five directions placement design have a very profound historical and cultural origin. If drawing the architectures of the five directions onto the paper and put them in t

22、he grid, it will be found that they constitute a pattern of the ancient scratchable latex. The so-called scratchable latex pattern is consisted of square grids with respectively three vertical and horizontal lines. As early as the slave society of Zhou dynasty two thousand years ago, it had already

23、become a kind of sacred scheme among people. The books of pre-Qin Dynasty have a range of scratchable latex layout patterns of astronomy and geography. One of the famous work before Qin Dynasty even deified the pattern and gave it a certain mathematical and philosophical meaning. Thus the schema has

24、 been closely linked with the running regularity of universe, including development rule of things of the ancient people in China. (Ju, 2004) The diagram of the scratchable latex has been widely used in ancient China and it is still quite mysterious. So it is inevitable that the Ming dynasty rulers

25、who abided Confucianism put it to the highest status and used it as the divine layout of the important architectural planning including the imperial palace, royal housing and even the tombs. (Goloany, 1989)4. Case study-Ding Ling Tomb, the underground mausoleum of Emperor Wan Li The Ming Tombs is ab

26、out 50 kilometers away from Beijing, which are the tombs of thirteen Ming dynasty emperors after moving the capital. The surrounding of the tombs set up defense at every mountain. Ten natural mountain tops were built with military fortifications such as walls. The Ming Tombs has a total area of over

27、 80 square kilometers. Yanshan Mountains stretch from the northwest and form a natural barrier around the tombs. Surrounded by mountains, the water in the small basins created by the floods flows to the central plains interaction, and then twists to the east. Under the green shade of the forests, a

28、range of glorious tomb architecture with red walls and golden roofs, located at the foothills of the east, west and north.(Jiang, 2003) Till now the Ming has a history of over 500 years, but they are well reserved. In 1992, the Ming Tombs was awarded as The best reserved emperor tomb groups by Beiji

29、ng Tourism committee. In 2003, it was listed as the “World Cultural Heritage “by UNESCO. (Jiang, 2003)The Ding Ling Tomb is the only one of the thirteen emperor tombs which opened to the public, as well as the first emperor tomb excavated by Chinese researchers. The Ding Ling Tomb is the tomb of the

30、 Emperor Wanli of the lat Ming dynasty. It was built since 1584 and finished after six years. Thirty years later Emperor Wanli and his queen were successively buried into the underground chamber of Ding Ling Tomb. The Xuan Palace of Ding Ling Tomb is the core part of the tomb buildings and it is als

31、o the position of coffins. The layout of the Xuan Palace can be described as” five rooms and three tunnels. (Jiang, 2003)Five rooms refers to that the Xuan Palace is combined with five rooms. Among the five rooms, the rear room is also called the rear palace, which is the main chamber of Xuan Palace

32、 and looks like a horizontal rectangular form. The indoor surface is 30.1 meters wide, 9.1 meters deep and 9.5 meters high. The top is a horizontal stone arch, the cutting section assumes the spire, the two arcs intersection forms a” bottom stamp shape. (Jiang, 2003) Indoor ground is paved with grin

33、ding flat square spotted stone slabs. At the center of the inner part it is equipped with a coffin bed, which paved with the same rocks on the ground. The coffin bed is decorated with white marble stone. The bed or the throne has a square hold which is 0.4 meters long and 0.2 meters wide. Inside the

34、 hole is yellow soil, which reflects the golden well in traditional Fengshui theory. It is said that this scheme can protect and create the fortune. (Liu, 2006) On the throne, there are the emperor and queens coffin and their treasure. The middle room is in the front of rear room, which connects the

35、 other four rooms and has the hub status among the five rooms. The indoor vertical wall is like a rectangular plane with 6 meter width, 32 meter depth and 7.2 meters tall. It is the longitudinal direction of the stone arch structure. (Jiang, 2003) The indoor ground is paved with square bricks with t

36、hin materials. At the western part, the thrones and ever-burning lamps of one emperor and two queens are displayed. The thrones are carved with white marble, which just like the thrones they used when they were alive. The back of the emperors throne is carved with five dragon heads. The inner side o

37、f the back is decorated with dragon pattern. (Liu, 2006)The scheme of the queens throne is similar as the emperors. The only difference is that the phoenix patter replaced the dragon pattern. The front room is also called the front palace; its ground is like a rectangle. The ceiling and ground pavem

38、ent are as the same as the middle room, however its depth is 20 meters, and there is no displaying indoor. The left and right room is located symmetrically on both sides of the middle room. The plane is a horizontal rectangle with 26 meters width. The depth is 7 meters and the height is 7.4 meters.

39、There two rooms ground are paved with bluish white marble slabs and have the coffin beds as well. (Paludan, 1994)In terms of the three tunnels, it refers to the three tunnels in Xuan Palace. The tunnel connects the front room is the main tunnel. According to records, the tunnel is divided into two s

40、egments, the brick part and the stone part. From the tunnel on the right side of Treasure City to Minglou is the brick tunnel. At the ending of the brick tunnel there is a slightly curved low wall with four layers. Along the low wall to the inner part, there is the starting point of the stone tunnel

41、 which near Xuan Palace. The direction of the stone tunnel is the front room of Xuan Palace. It walls on both sides are paved with tinea stone. Along with the deepening of the tunnel, it increases from 1 layer to 17 layers. The stone tunnel has a length of 40 meters and a width of 8 meters. (Liu, 20

42、06)According to the literature of Ming dynasty, the Fa Palace of the Ming dynasty refers to the Qianqing Palace, where the emperor lived at daily time, as well as the overall imperial palaces of the Forbidden City and the buildings of theAltarofHeaven. All in all, the layout of five room and three t

43、unnels of the Ding Ling Tomb has coincident spatial relationships with the placement of the architecture of the Forbidden City and the AltarofHeaven, which is also the powerful interpretation for the Ding Ling Tomb to imitate the former system to establish the scratch able latex palace.(Jiang, 2003)

44、5. Conclusion Traditional Chinese philosophy proposes that the buildings should face the south. According to this idea, there had been many things promoted by feudal emperors thoughts, such as the temples, palaces and tombs. In terms of the spatial relationships among the Ming Tombs, the Forbidden C

45、ity and the AltarofHeaven are also created by this concept. Besides that, the traditional Chinese concept of heaven and earth is orbicular sky and rectangular earth. (Golany, 1989) However the ancient emperors regard themselves as the sons of heaven, they were granted sovereignty to manage the earth

46、. To sum up the spatial relationships of the Ming Tombs, the Forbidden City and the AltarofHeaven, the purpose of establishing the Altar of heaven is to meet the emperors demand of worshiping the god. The set-up of the Forbidden City is providing a place to work and live for the royal family, while the tombs are the places to store the bodies of royal members. So their const