Ming Tombs View Photos
The Ming Tombs located in Changping District, about 50 kilometers from the northwest of Beijing, is enclosed by mountains in three sides. The imperial cemetery covers an area of 120 square kilometers with 13 Ming emperors, 23 empresses and a number of concubines, princes, and princesses buried there, and thus it is also called 13 Mausoleums. These tombs are the best preserved Chinese imperial tombs and has been nominated by the UNESCO as the world cultural heritages.
The site of the Ming Dynasty Imperial Tombs was carefully chosen according to Fengshui (geomancy) belief. The first tomb, Chang Ling, or Tomb of Chang, began to be built by the third emperor of the Ming Dynasty in the seventh year of his reign (1409 AD) before the main peak of Tian Shou (literally, heavenly longevity)Mountain. (The first emperor of Ming Dynasty was buried in Najing). In chronological order for the following 200 years, Xiang Ling(Ling means great tomb in Chinese), Jing Ling, Yu Ling, Mao Ling, Zong Ling, Kang Ling, Yong Ling, Zhao Ling, Ding Ling, Qing Ling and De Ling were built and spread on both sides of the Chang Ling. All these tombs share a same Sacred Way that crosses the middle of the tomb zone. The last tomb, for Emperor Chongzhen, Zhu Youjian, lying in the southwest of the zone, was actually built out of a tomb originally intended for a concubine. Several decades after the death of the last Ming emperor, Emperor Shunzhi of the Qing Dynasty gave the last Ming Tomb the tile and added the architecture on the ground. Besides the emperor's tombs scatters lots of smaller tombs for concubines and a eunuch.
According to the Feng Shui belief the tombs zone is screened by green high mountains on three sides and with a river flowing by. Tourists enter the tomb zone through the Sacred Way, on both sides of which there stands totally 36 stone sculptures. Among the 18 pairs of the sculptures, 24 are stone animals and 12 human figures. The customs of erecting stone sculptures in front of the imperial commentaries started as early as the Qin (221-206 BC) Dynasty. They show the supreme authorities and dignities of the emperor and signify that they are still the supreme ruler after death. All these stone sculptures are huge; some exceeds 30 cubic meters in volume. In the ancient time without modern machine and vehicles, these heavy stone sculptures were transported here all entirely by manpower like this: in winter time, water was splashed on the road. When the slippy icy coating took form on the road, the labors hauled the sculpture forward on the ice. Every 500 meters a well was dug to get water for making the ice. Therefore, it was a tough job for building an imperial tomb. The tombs zone is so vast that tourist normally only see two of the 13 tombs, namely, Chang Ling – the largest in architectural scale and Ding Ling – the only excavated one so far.
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