Daming Palace: Inside the Tang Dynasty’s Imperial Complex
The Palace of Great Brilliance, the Daming Palace (大明宫), in Xi’an (西安), Shaanxi, served as the royal residence of the Tang (唐朝) emperors for more than two centuries.
At that time, Xi’an was known as Chang’an (长安), Perpetual Peace, the ancient capital of China for more than ten dynasties. During its heyday, the capital was one of the largest and most populous cities in the world, counting 800,000-1,000,000 people within city walls.
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History
Work on Daming Palace started in 634, under the rule of Emperor Taizong (唐太宗), during the Tang Dynasty. The Emperor ordered the construction of a summer palace for Gaozu (唐高祖), his retired father, as an act of filial piety. However, the father died when its construction entered its 2nd year and the work was suspended. One day, thirty years later, Empress Wu (武则天) wanted a new palace and asked Yan Liben (阎立本), the imperial court painter and architect, to design it. Construction commenced again in 662 and a year later was completed. On 5 June 663, the Tang Imperial court relocated from the Taiji Palace into the Daming Palace. Long forgotten, the Daming Palace was discovered in 1957. A couple of years later the earliest excavations and surveys were carried out by the Institute of Archaeology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Scale
Once complete, Daming Palace became the largest palace complex in the world at the time, covering an area estimated between 3.2 and 3.7 square kilometers depending on the source. Comparisons commonly used to convey its size include roughly four and a half times the area of Beijing’s Forbidden City (紫禁城) and about three times the Palace of Versailles. The palace wall ran for a circumference of 7.6 kilometers, pierced by eleven gates, and archaeologists have identified the remains of more than forty halls, terraces and pavilions across the site. From the reign of Emperor Gaozong (唐高宗) onward, seventeen Tang emperors conducted state affairs at Daming Palace over a span of more than 240 years, earning it the names “Palace of Palaces” and “Eastern Holy Palace.”
Structure
The complex is composed of Three Great Halls, Hanyuan Hall (含元殿), Xuanzheng Hall (宣政殿) and Zichen Hall (紫宸殿), respectively part of the outer, middle, and inner court. The palace grounds included an Academy of music for actors and performers, a cockfighting arena, a bell tower, a drum tower, an archery hall, a lake, and a cuju football field.
Today
In 1995, a plan was adopted for the restoration and preservation of the site, and the Daming Palace National Heritage Park opened to the public on the original grounds in 2010. On 22 June 2014, the site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as part of “Silk Roads: the Routes Network of Chang’an-Tianshan Corridor,” a joint nomination submitted by China, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan.
Images of Daming Palace
Source:
http://en.people.cn/n3/2016/0921/c90000-9118005.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daming_Palace
http://english.cntv.cn/program/documentary/20110601/100303.shtml
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Topic: Daming Palace images, Daming Palace China, daming palace architecture,daming palace today,daming palace national heritage park,daming palace xi’an,daming palace chang’an,the daming palace & tang dynasty
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