Are there any historical allusions to the Temple of Heaven?
The Temple of Heaven covers an area of 2.72 million square meters, which is bigger than the Forbidden City. It has two walls to form an inner altar and an outer altar. The altar wall is round in the south and round in the north, which symbolizes the round place. The ball altar is in the south, the valley prayer altar is in the north, and the two altars are on the same north-south axis, separated by a wall. The main buildings of the ball altar are the ball altar and the imperial dome, and the main buildings of the valley prayer altar are the hall of prayer for the new year, the palace and the door of prayer for the new year.
The main building of the Temple of Heaven is located in the inner altar, which is arranged in a straight line from south to north. All the palaces and altars face south in a circle, symbolizing the sky. The whole layout and architectural structure are unique. The Hall of Prayer for the New Year is the place where the emperor prayed for a bumper harvest. It is a circular hall with three eaves, 38 meters high and 32.72 meters in diameter. It has a blue glazed tile roof, all brick and wood structure, and no long purlin beams. It is supported by 28 wooden pillars and 36 purlins, which has high artistic value in architectural modeling.
In the early Ming dynasty, heaven and earth were worshiped together, and the altars in the northern and southern suburbs were worshipped together. The place where the sacrifice is held is called Dasitang, which is a square building with eleven rooms. In the 9th year of Jiajing in the Ming Dynasty (1530), heaven and earth were separated, and a dome altar was built in the Temple of Heaven to worship heaven, and another Fangze altar was built in the northern suburb. The magnificent temples originally dedicated to heaven and earth were gradually abandoned. In the 19th year of Jiajing (1540), the original big sacrifice hall was changed into a big pleasure hall, and a circular building began.
After the Qing court entered the customs, everything was still in accordance with the old system of the Ming Dynasty. During the Qianlong period, the national strength was strong and the Temple of Heaven was built. In the twelfth year of Qianlong (1747), the emperor decided to rebuild the inner and outer walls of the Temple of Heaven, changing the earth wall into city bricks, and wrapping two layers of city bricks from the middle to the top. The width of the top of the inner altar wall is reduced to 4 feet 8 inches, and there are no eaves columns, making it a hanging gallery without colonnade. After the reconstruction, the inner and outer walls of the Temple of Heaven are thicker, and the GAI is more than ten miles long, making it a magnificent scenery. The main buildings of the Temple of Heaven, such as the Hall for Praying for the New Year, the Imperial Palace and the Dome, were also rebuilt at this time and have been preserved to this day.
Qiu Qiu altar, also known as Tiantan altar and Tiantai altar, is an open-air three-story circular stone altar where the emperor worships heaven from winter to the sun. It was built in the 9th year of Jiajing in Ming Dynasty (1530) and expanded in the 14th year of Qingganlong (1749). The altar is 534 meters in circumference and 5.2 meters in height. Divided into three layers: upper, middle and lower. The number of columns and steps on each floor is Yang (also called "Tian", that is, a multiple of nine), which means "Ninth Five-Year Plan". The surface of the altar is made of mugwort bluestone. Except that the stone in the center is round, the outer circle of the altar is fan-shaped and the figures are positive. Each floor has a white marble fence post, which is a multiple of 9. There are 72 railings on the upper floor, middle floor 108 and lower floor180,360 days. The ancients thought that nine was the pole of yang number, indicating the highest to the maximum, and the emperor was the son of heaven, which was also the highest to the maximum, so the whole world used multiples of nine to express the authority of the son of heaven. The circular mound altar has two low walls, the outer and inner circles, symbolizing a round place. The ancillary buildings of the ball altar include the imperial vault and its accessories, the sacred vault, the sacrificial pavilion and the three vaults (sacrificial vault, musical instrument vault and Brown's recommendation vault). Standing on the boulder in the middle of the top floor of the ball altar, although whispering, it is very loud. So whenever the emperor sacrifices to heaven here, his loud voice is like an Oracle from heaven, and the solemn atmosphere during the sacrifice is even more mysterious. This is because the surface of the altar is smooth, and the sound wave can quickly spread in all directions, hitting the surrounding stone fence, reflecting back and merging with the original sound, so the volume is doubled.
The imperial vault is located in the north of the dome altar, where sacrificial tablets are stored. It was founded in the 9th year of Jiajing in Ming Dynasty (1530), formerly known as Taimiao, and renamed as Royal Treasury in the 17th year of Jiajing (1538). It is a pyramid-shaped roof building with two eaves. In the seventeenth year of Qing Qianlong (1752), it was rebuilt and changed into a pyramid-shaped roof with gold-plated roof and single eaves and blue tiles. There are five rooms, and each room has something. The main hall and the east and west halls are surrounded by a smooth round wall. People speak in different positions on the wall, and people standing by the wall in the distance can hear clearly. This is the echo wall. Under the steps of the imperial vault, there are three stone slabs, namely echo stones: standing on the first stone slab near the steps, clapping your hands, you can hear one echo, standing on the second stone slab, clapping your hands, you can hear two echoes, and standing on the third stone slab, you can hear three echoes.
Echo walls are the walls of the imperial vault. The wall is 3.72m high, 0.9m thick, 61.5m in diameter and193.2m in circumference. The wall is made of brick on the ground, with blue glazed tiles on it. The radian of the fence is very regular, the wall is extremely smooth and tidy, and the refraction of sound waves is also very regular. As long as two people stand behind the east and west annex halls respectively, stick to the wall, and one person speaks to the north wall, the sound waves will continue to refract along the wall and reach the other end of one or two hundred meters. No matter how small the voice is, it can also make the other party hear clearly. The voice is long and interesting, giving people a mysterious atmosphere of "the connection between heaven and man". So it is called "Echo Wall".
The Ball Altar, the Imperial Dome and the Valley Prayer Altar are three main buildings on the central axis. Connecting these three main buildings is a long platform running through the north and south, which is called Single Pen Bridge, also known as Shinto or Seaview Avenue. It is 360 meters long, 29.4 meters wide and 1 meter high at the southern end. It gradually rises to 3 meters from south to north, symbolizing that this road is connected with the Tiangong, and the emperor ascended to heaven step by step from south to north. In the middle of the single bridge is Shinto, on the left is Imperial Road, and on the right is King Road. The emperor takes the imperial way, the ministers take the kingly way, and the immortals take the Shinto way. There is an east-west tunnel under the bridge, which is the hole where livestock are sent to be slaughtered before sacrifice.
The main building of the Temple of Heaven is the Hall of Praying for the New Year, which was built in the 18th year of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty (1420). Every year, the emperor held a ceremony to worship heaven here, praying for good weather and good harvests. The Hall of Prayer for the New Year is circular, with a diameter of 32 meters and a height of 38 meters. This is an rotunda with triple eaves and a gilded roof. The eaves are dark blue and covered with blue glazed tiles, because the sky is blue and symbolizes the sky.
Its architectural excellence lies in that the Hall of Prayer for the New Year is supported by 28 nanmu columns and 36 interconnected table rafters. These big pillars have different symbolic meanings: the four pillars in the middle are called Tian Tongzhu, representing the four seasons; Twelve gold pillars in the middle layer represent twelve months; Twelve eaves columns on the outer layer represent twelve o'clock; Twenty-four solar terms are expressed by adding the middle layer and the outer layer; The three layers add up to 28, representing 28 stars; Add eight sub-columns at the top of the column, representing thirty-six days; The Leigong column under the top of the treasure represents the emperor's unification of the whole country. Its ancillary buildings include the Imperial Palace, the gate for praying for the New Year, the God Library, the God Chef, the sacrificial pavilion, the wood stove, the coffin pit, the service platform, the sacrificial road and 72 long corridors. There is a seven-star stone in the square to the south of the promenade, engraved with mountain-shaped moire, which was placed in the Jiajing period of Ming Dynasty.
This hall is located on a circular white marble pedestal, covering an area of over 5,900 square meters. The base is divided into three layers and is 6 meters high. Each floor has carved white marble railings. This platform and the main hall are an inseparable artistic whole. When tourists walk out of the gate of the New Year's Prayer Hall and look south, they see a straight tunnel, which extends all the way south. The porches along the way are heavy, and the farther you go, the more endless you can see, and there is a feeling of falling from the sky. No wonder a French architectural expert said after visiting the Temple of Heaven: skyscrapers are much higher than the Hall of Prayer for the Year, but they are not as tall and deep as the Hall of Prayer for the Year, and they cannot reach the artistic height of the Hall of Prayer for the Year. This temple was destroyed by lightning in 1889 (the 15th year of Guangxu reign). It is said that at that time, the pillars of the hall were made of Daphne, and when they burned, they could smell delicious for miles away. The following year, the emperor called ministers to discuss the reconstruction of the Hall of Prayer for the New Year. Unable to find the pattern, the Ministry of Industry, which is in charge of national construction affairs, called the craftsmen who had participated in the restoration of the Hall of Prayer for the Year, and asked them to make the pattern according to memory and dictation before construction. Therefore, the current Hall of Prayer for the New Year was built during the Guangxu period of the Qing Dynasty, but the basic architectural form and structure still retained the appearance of the Ming Dynasty.
In the Hall of Prayer for the New Year, the ceiling is an exquisite "Jiulong Algae Well", and the Longjing column is painted with gold characters. There is a flat round marble in the center of the temple, and the pattern on the stone surface is a natural dragon and phoenix pattern. Yi Long leads a phoenix, which is called "Dragon and Phoenix Stone", that is, "Dragon and Phoenix are auspicious". According to legend, there is only a phoenix pattern on this stone, but there is only a carved dragon in the algae well at the top of the temple. With the growth of age, the dragon and the phoenix are inspired, and Jinlong often flies down to find the phoenix on the Phoenix Stone for fun. Unexpectedly, one day, I met Emperor Jiajing and bowed down on the stone. Jinlong has no time to fly back. Together with the phoenix on the stone, it was crushed into the boulder by Emperor Jiajing and never came out again. Since then, it has become a deep and shallow dragon and phoenix stone. 1889 When the Hall of Prayer for the New Year was burned, this dragon and phoenix stone was smoked and burned for a day and a night. Although the stone was not burned to pieces, the dragon pattern was burned to light black and the phoenix pattern was blurred. In front of the Hall of Prayer for the New Year, there are nine halls in the east and nine halls in the west, which are called Dong Gai and Xi Gai, and are warehouses for collecting memorial tablets. When offering sacrifices to heaven in the Ming Dynasty, in addition to offering sacrifices to the emperor gods, it is also necessary to offer sacrifices to the ancestors of the royal family Zhu, as well as the gods and emperors of the past dynasties, such as the sun, the moon, the five stars, the five mountains in the east, the west, the south, the north and the middle, the five small mountains and five towns, the four seas (rivers and lakes), storms, mountains and rivers, traditional Taoism and so on.
Another important building of the prayer altar is the Huang Gan Hall, which is located in a rectangular courtyard, surrounded by a prayer wall and connected by a glass door. This is a temple-style hall, covered with blue glazed tiles, with the base of white marble railings below. It is a temple dedicated to the "God of the Emperor" and the ancestors of the Emperor. God's slate is enshrined in a shrine shaped like a house. On the first and fifteenth day of the lunar calendar, the yamen responsible for offering sacrifices regularly sends officials to sweep away dust and burn incense. The day before the sacrifice, after the emperor came here to burn incense and salute, the minister of rites burned incense, and then he knelt down three times and knocked nine times. Then the officials of Taichang Temple headed by Qing asked them to put the tablet in Long Ting, and it was carried to the corresponding shrine in the Hall of Prayer for the Year by Yi Wei Er.
Zhaigong is located in the south of the west gate of the Temple of Heaven, east-west. It is the place where the emperor fasted and bathed before coming to the Temple of Heaven to pray for blessings. Therefore, it can also be said to be a small palace. It has Miyagi, and the palace wall has two layers: the outer layer is called brick wall, and the inner city is called purple wall. The outer city is mainly a defense facility, and there are duty rooms in the four corners of the outer city. There is a bell tower in the northeast corner of the outer city. Every time the emperor went in and out of the fasting palace, he would ring the bell to greet him. The inner city of Zhan Mu Palace is divided into three parts: front, middle and back. The front is centered on the main hall; Behind is the emperor's inner house; In the middle is a long and narrow courtyard with five cloisters and tile houses at both ends, which are the eunuch manager and the eunuch duty room respectively. Zhai Palace covers an area of 40,000 square meters and has more than 200 buildings. Although it is not as grand as the Forbidden City, it is also magnificent and elegant. Emperors of Ming and Qing dynasties came to this "wisdom house" for three days. Only two days before Yong Zhengdi's "Smart House" was changed to the Forbidden City, and moved to the Temple of Heaven on the last day. There are two imperial ditches on the periphery, and there is a 163 corridor around the inner dike of the outer ditch. There are five halls in the east of the palace, which are brick structures without beam hall coupons. On the platform of the main hall, there is a bronze pavilion for fasting and an hour tablet pavilion. There are five sleeping halls behind the temple, and there is a bell tower in the northeast corner, which contains the Yongle Year Clock.
The Divine Music Department was established in the northwest outside the Xitianmen Gate of Waqiutan in the 18th year of Yongle in Ming Dynasty (1420). The Divine Music Department is the organ that manages the performance of ancient music when offering sacrifices to China. The Ming Dynasty called God optimistic. At that time, Taoist priests were music and dance officials and musicians who valued God. When Yongle moved its capital to Beijing in the 18th year of Ming Dynasty, 300 musicians and dancers entered Beijing. After that, God was optimistic and kept about 600 musicians and dancers. By Jiajing, the total number of musicians and dancers had reached 2,200.