The Great Wall of China (Simplified Chinese: 万里长城; Traditional Chinese: 萬里長城; Hanyu Pinyin: Wànlĭ Chángchéng; literally "10,000 Li¹ long wall"), is an ancient Chinese fortification built circa 200 BCE and greatly strengthened from the 14th century until the beginning of the 17th century, during the Ming Dynasty, in order to protect the Ming empire from raids by the Mongols and Turkic tribes. It was preceded by several walls built since the 3rd century BC against the raids of nomadic tribes coming from areas in modern-day Mongolia and Manchuria. It was improved upon by Chin Dyanasty leader, Shih Whang-Ti (218-202 bce). The Wall stretches over a formidable 6,352 km (3,948 miles), from Shanhai Pass on the Bohai Sea in the east, at the limit between China proper and Manchuria, to Lop Nur in the southeastern portion of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (refer to University of Washington: A. The Main Caravan Routes (b) The “Central Route” or “Middle Route.”).
The Great Wall in the
winter, near Beijing
History
A defensive wall on the northern border was built and maintained by several dynasties at different times in Chinese history. There have been five major walls:
- 208 BC (Qin Dynasty)
- 1st century BC (Han Dynasty)
- 7th century CE (Sui Dynasty)
- 1138 - 1198 (Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period)
- 1368 - 1640 (from Hongwu Emperor until Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty)
The first major wall was built during the reign of the First Emperor, the main emperor of the short-lived Qin dynasty. This wall was not constructed as a single endeavor, but by joining several regional walls built by the Warring States. The walls that were linked together at this time consisted of rammed earth with watch towers built at regular intervals. It was located much further north than the current Great Wall with its eastern end at modern day North Korea. Very little of this first wall remains - photos reveal a low, long mound.
The government ordered people to work on the wall, and workers were under perpetual danger of being attacked by brigands. Because many people died while building the wall, it has obtained the gruesome title, "longest cemetery on Earth" or "the long graveyard." Possibly as many as one million workers died building the wall.
The later long walls built by the Han, the Sui, and the Ten Kingdoms period were also built along the same design. They were made of rammed earth with multi-story watch towers built every few miles. These walls have also largely vanished into the surrounding landscape, eroded away by wind and rain.
In military terms, these walls were more frontier demarcations than defensive fortifications of worth. Certainly Chinese military strategy did not revolve around holding the wall.
The Great Wall seen today was built during the Ming Dynasty, starting around the year 1368 and lasting till around 1640. This new wall was built on a grand scale with longer lasting materials (solid stone used for the sides and the top of the Wall) than any wall built before. The primary purpose of the wall was to make it difficult for semi-nomadic people outside the wall (such as the Mongols under Altan Khan and the Oirats under Esen Taiji) to raid into China with their horses or return with stolen property.
The Ming Dynasty Great Wall starts on the eastern end at Shanhai Pass, near Qinhuangdao, in Hebei Province, next to Bohai Gulf. Spanning nine provinces and 100 counties, the final 500 kilometers have all but turned to rubble, and today it ends on the western end at the historic site of Jiayu Pass (嘉峪关), located in northwest Gansu Province at the limit of the Gobi Desert and the oases of the Silk Road. Jiayu Pass was intended to greet travelers along the Silk Road. Even though The Great Wall ends at Jiayu Pass, there are many watchtowers (烽火台 fēng huǒ tái) extending beyond Jiayu Pass along the Silk Road. These towers communicated by smoke to signal invasion.
The Kokes Manchus crossed the Wall by convincing an important general Wu Sangui to open the gates of Shanhai Pass and allow the Manchus to cross. Legend has it that it took three days for the Manchu armies to pass. After the Manchu conquered China, the Wall was of no strategic value, mainly because the Manchu extended their political control far to the north, much farther than any previous Chinese dynasty. See more on the Manchu Dynasty.
The last great wall of the Ming really was a military fortification of some strength. However, military historians are generally dismissive of the net value of this great wall. It was astonishingly expensive to build, maintain and garrison. The money the Ming spent on the wall could have been spent on other military capabilities such as European style artillery or muskets. The fact remains that the great wall was of no help at all in the Ming dynasty's fall.
Condition
'First Gate Under Heaven', under repairs.
Storehouse and barracks near Beijing
While some portions near tourist centers have been preserved and even reconstructed, in most locations the Wall is in disrepair, serving as a playground for some villages and a source of stones to rebuild houses and roads. Sections of the Wall are also prone to graffiti. Parts have been destroyed because the Wall is in the way of construction sites. Intact or repaired portions of the Wall near developed tourist areas are often plagued with hawkers of tourist kitsch. The Gobi Desert is also encroaching on the wall in some places. Some estimates say that only 20% of the wall is in a good condition. In 2005, pictures of a rave party on the Great Wall surfaced in the Chinese media. There was widespread public outrage as photos of foreign, as well as Chinese, youths drinking, urinating, defecating and engaging in sexual activities on the wall were shown throughout the country.
Watchtowers and barracks
The wall is complemented by defensive fighting stations, to which wall defenders may retreat if overwhelmed.
Each tower has unique and restricted stairways and entries to confuse attackers.
Barracks and administrative centers are located at larger intervals.
Materials
The materials used are those available near the site of construction. Near Beijing the wall is constructed from quarried limestone blocks. In other locations it may be quarried granite or fired brick. Where such materials are used, two finished walls are erected with packed earth and rubble fill placed in between with a final paving to form a single unit. In some areas the blocks were cemented with a mixture of sticky rice and egg whites.
In the extreme western desert locations, where good materials are scarce, the wall was constructed from dirt rammed between rough wood tied together with woven mats.
Recognition
The Great Wall of China as seen in a
false-color radar image from the Space Shuttle, taken in April 1994
The Great Wall of China in 1907, as photographed by Herbert Ponting. Over the centuries, there had been a number of attempts to build some sort of fortification or earthworks along this route, but the wall that appears here was built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).
The Wall is included in lists of the "Seven Medieval Wonders of the World" but was of course not one of the classical Seven Wonders of the World recognized by the ancient Greeks.
The Wall was made a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987.
The Chinese have a saying, 不到长城非好汉 bú dào Chángchéng fēi hǎo hàn, roughly meaning "you're not a real man if you haven't climbed the Great Wall".
From outer space
There is a longstanding disagreement about how visible the wall is in space. The notion of its visibility from outer space greatly predates manned space flight.
Richard Halliburton's 1938 book Second Book of Marvels said the Great Wall is the only man-made object visible from the moon, and a "Ripley's Believe It or Not" cartoon from the same decade makes a similar claim. This popular belief has persisted, assuming urban legend status, sometimes even entering school textbooks. Arthur Waldron, author of the single most authoritative history of the Great Wall written in any language, has speculated that the belief about the Great Wall's visibility from outer space might go all the way back to the fascination with the "canals" some people during the late nineteenth century believed to exist on Mars. (The logic was strange and simple: If Earthlings can see the Martians' canals, the Martians might be able to see the Great Wall.) But in fact, the Great Wall simply cannot be seen by the unaided eye from the distance of the moon, much less that of Mars.
The distance from the earth to the moon is about a thousand times greater than the distance from the earth to a spacecraft in near-earth orbit. If the Great Wall was visible from the moon, it would be easy to see from near-earth orbit. In fact, from near-earth orbit, it is barely visible, and only under nearly perfect conditions. And it is no more conspicuous than many other manmade objects.
One shuttle astronaut reported that "we can see things as small as airport runways [but] the Great Wall is almost invisible from only 180 miles (290 km) up." Astronaut William Pogue thought he had seen it from Skylab but discovered he was actually looking at the Grand Canal near Beijing. He spotted the Great Wall with binoculars, but said that "it wasn't visible to the unaided eye." An Apollo astronaut said no human structures were visible at a distance of a few thousand miles. U.S Senator Jake Garn claimed to be able to see the Great Wall with the naked eye from a space shuttle orbit in the early 1980s, but his claim has been disputed by several professional U.S. astronauts. Chinese astronaut Yang Liwei said he couldn't see it at all.
From low-earth orbit it may be visible under favorable conditions. Features on the moon that are dramatically visible at times can be undetectable on others, due to changes in lighting direction. The Great Wall is only a few meters wide — sized similar to highways and airport runways — and is about the same color as the soil surrounding it.
Veteran U.S. astronaut Gene Cernan has stated: "At Earth orbit of 160 km to 320 km high, the Great Wall of China is, indeed, visible to the naked eye." Ed Lu, Expedition 7 Science Officer aboard the International Space Station, adds that, "...it's less visible than a lot of other objects. And you have to know where to look."
Leroy Chiao, a Chinese-American astronaut, took a photograph from the International Space Station that shows the wall. It was so indistinct that the photographer was not certain he had actually captured it. Based on the photograph, the state-run China Daily newspaper concluded that the Great Wall can be seen from space with the naked eye, under favorable viewing conditions, if one knows exactly where to look. ([1])
See also
Further reading
Roland Michaud (Photographer), Sabrina Michaud (Photographer), Michel Jan, The Great Wall of China (2001) ISBN 0789207362
Arthur Waldron, The Great Wall of China: From History to Myth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1990.
External links
Notes
¹ 10,000 li = 5,760 km. (3,580 miles). In Chinese, 10,000 figuratively means "infinite", and the number should not be interpreted for its actual value, but rather as meaning the "infinitely long wall".
More photos
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September 2004. Albert Hazan
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September 2004. Albert Hazan
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Great Wall, Beijing. Summer 2004
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Great Wall, Beijing. Summer 2004
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Great Wall, Beijing. Summer 2004
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Great Wall, Beijing. Summer 2004
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