Welcome to "Yiqi Liao-Things about the Forbidden City", I am Yilin.
In the last issue, we mentioned that Qingning Palace in the Shenyang Forbidden City combines the typical characteristics of Manchu traditional architecture. People usually summarize these characteristics as "pocket houses, 10,000-character kangs, and chimneys built on the ground."
In this issue, let’s talk about what this old saying really means.
Before the Qing Dynasty entered the Pass, the emperor did not have a separate bedroom, but lived with the empress, so Qingning Palace was the "central palace" where Huang Taiji and Empress Zhezhe lived.
Qingning Palace is a building with five hard-topped front and back corridors. Except for the glazed tiles on the roof and the colorful paintings under the eaves, there is no excessive decoration on the outside. It can be said to be quite simple as the "inner court palace".
The so-called "pocket room" means that the doors of the five rooms of Qingning Palace are opened in the east room, and the four rooms on the west side of the room have no partition walls, just like a pocket that opens from one end.
This is significantly different from the way the Han architecture opens the door from the middle.
Walking into the main room of Qingning Palace, the first thing you see is the fire kang connected by three corners. This is the old saying "10,000-character kang", also called "bend kang".
Among them, the southern kang and the northern kang are for living and sitting, and the narrow kang on the west is for offering sacrifices to the gods.
Qingning Palace was not only the residence of the emperor, but also the place where the emperor held family ceremonies.
The "wanzi kang" was created by ethnic minorities living in the Northeast for a long time to adapt to the severe winter weather, and it is still very common in the rural areas of the Northeast.
The chimney connecting the fire-kang flue in the Qingning Palace is built on the west side of the back of the house, from the ground, which is different from the chimney in Han houses built on the roof.
The chimneys in the Qingning Palace are collected from bottom to top step by step, with a total of twelve floors. Some people have said that this foreshadows a total of twelve emperors in the Qing Dynasty.
In addition, because only this chimney remained in the Shenyang Forbidden City, some people said that it was specially arranged by the emperor back then, and its intention was to "unify (tube) the world."
Does this chimney really herald the fate of Qing Dynasty?
What do you think?
Okay, thanks for watching this issue of "Yiqi Liao", I am Yilin, see you next time!
Editor in charge: [Li Jun]