Facts about the Great Wall of China: length, height, history of creation

China, officially the People’s Republic of China, is a vast East Asian country with a rich history and culture. With a population of over 1.4 billion people, it is the second most populous country in the world and the third-largest by land area. The capital of China is Beijing, and its official language is Mandarin Chinese.

Where is the Great Wall of China

The Great Wall of China is one of the most iconic monuments of world architecture; it is included in the Seven Wonders of the World list. The Great Wall of China is located in the country’s north and runs through several provinces, from Liaoning to Gansu. Once, the building served as protection from nomadic raids, but today, it is of great historical value. There are no analogs to the Great Wall of China, but other unusual barriers exist worldwide. We talk about them in the article The Great Walls of the World.

From space, it is visible that this giant “fence” begins at the Liaodong Bay of the Yellow Sea in northeast China, passes through northern China, and heads towards the Gobi Desert. The visible part is more than 2,500 kilometers long, but the wall is much longer.

The History of the Great Wall of China

The history of the Great Wall of China is unique, as is each section, which has its characteristics depending on the time and dynasty, historical events, and cataclysms. It began in 221 BC.

The idea of erecting the barrier belongs to the ruler of the kingdom of Qin, the first emperor of unified China, Qin Shi Huang. In the 3rd century BC, he ended the internal wars of the seven warring principalities of the so-called Warring States era. He united the country, proclaiming the absolute power of the emperor. The task was to block the northwestern borders of the state.

The first section of the wall was slightly less than three kilometers long, but over time, the wall was completed and reconstructed, and hazardous areas were reinforced with multi-layered structures in three or even four rows. The work was carried out for almost twenty centuries until the beginning of the XVII century AD. The Great Wall is rightfully called the construction site of thousands of years and the most grandiose defensive structure in world history.

Surprisingly, the end of the outstanding construction was also put by the Qin Dynasty, which came to power in 1644 after the fall of the Ming Dynasty. They were the last to invest money and effort in maintaining the wall. They just forgot about it.

For many years, it was destroyed until the authorities of modern China began to restore the facility in 1984. What could have been saved was restored, and some areas were demolished and rebuilt.

Why was the Chinese Wall built?

In ancient times, China was not a single power; it consisted of disparate kingdoms constantly at war. The Xiongnu tribe, a nomadic people who lived mainly in the steppes of northern China, behaved especially belligerently. Visit. A F R I N I K . C O M. For the full article. However, the main threat came from outside — the territories of today’s China were a tasty morsel for neighboring states.

So, a barrier was erected during the time of Qin Shi Huang, who united China. The world’s history had never known such a scale before. Just imagine a huge wall with a height of up to seven meters and a thickness of up to eight meters. A line of five horse riders or 10 soldiers could move along it at the same time.

However, the narrowest point of the wall is only 40 cm. This section, which is located on the Simatai pass and has a length of about 100 meters, was named the “Sky Bridge.”

Who built the Great wall

The whole world built the wall — peasants, soldiers of the Imperial army, and prisoners. The project was very costly, including human resources. At that time, there were no transport routes, and provisions and building materials were delivered off-road, through hills, rivers, and other rugged terrain.

It is estimated that the construction took the lives of almost three million Chinese. There are still legends that even the dead bones were used to strengthen the walls, but no historical confirmation of this has been found. However, the figurative understanding of “built on bones” is quite true.

The closure of borders blocked Chinese contact with the people of other countries. Under Qin Shi Huang, the grandiose construction was controlled by the commander Meng Tian. He came from an ancient family of architects and military men and was a special confidant of the emperor. He also contributed to creating China’s transport system and trade development.

Some wall sections were customs forts through which goods were exchanged with other countries. Subsequently, however, they played a fatal role. Due to the weak fortifications, Genghis Khan’s troops in the 13th century and the rebels in the 17th century were able to overcome them. Other sections of the wall were better reinforced.

The height of the walls with watchtowers allowed observers to notice external threats promptly, and the thickness of the wall made it impregnable. The guards signaled the danger with a drum beating. The information was transmitted with the help of drumming and signaling smoke fires, reaching the imperial palace in Beijing in a day.

What is the Chinese wall made of?

Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s primary idea was to create a massive earthen rampart, and the ancient part of the wall was located on an elevation. In the third century AD, the fortification began to be built on this rampart, not only from sand and stones.

The primary structure of the Ming Dynasty was built of stone blocks and bricks bonded together with a solution based on rice flour containing the natural binding substance amylopectin. This part of the array proved to be the most resistant. Thus, after launching the Daxihaizi reservoir in 1974, the Huanghuacheng site was partially flooded and still withstands the onslaught of water, receiving the name “Great Water Wall.”

In other eras, under other emperors, the wall was built of whatever was necessary — not only stones and bricks but also sand and wood, which, of course, could not but affect the reliability of some sections of the later periods.

The length of the Great Wall of China

According to information from the Celestial Empire, the Great Wall of China is 21,196.18 kilometers long. However, the actual length of the preserved part of the object is 8,851.8 kilometers. At the same time, the last construction work was carried out during the reign of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644); at that time, the length of the Chinese wall was more than 6,000 kilometers, and it is this part that we mean nowadays when we talk about the Great Wall of China.

Length in the Qin era: about 3,000 kilometers. The bulk hill has almost the same length.
Length in the Ming Dynasty: 8851 kilometers, according to the State Administration of Cartography of China. The construction period was 1368-1644.

The official length is now 21,196 km (18 meters). This was announced in 2012 by experts from the State Administration for Ancient Cultural Monuments of China. Scientists from China concluded this after five years of studying the object. However, these data are still being clarified, as some wall sections were laid on top of the previous ones with a slight deviation. In addition, the Chinese considered not only the northern stronghold of China, which is called the Great Wall of China but also other fortifications in the south of the country.

The borders of the Chinese wall

The central part, built in the Ming era, ran from east to west from the Shanhaiguan outpost on the shore of the Yellow Sea to the Yumenguan outpost on the border of the provinces of Gansu and Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The primary part of the wall runs along China’s northern border, and its numerous fortifications stretch along gorges, strategically important hills, and spurs along the entire length of buildings, including fortifications inside the country, passing through 15 provinces and municipalities. The largest and most historically significant are Beijing, Liaoning, Shanxi, Gansu, Ningxia, Tianjin, Shanxi, Inner Mongolia, and Hebei.

Interesting facts about the Great Wall of China

At an average walking speed, it will take a person more than a year to walk the entire route of the Great Wall of China. Modern research and excavations prove that one of the earliest massifs of the Great Wall of China is now located in modern Mongolia. This segment is about 100 meters long.

It is impossible to see the wall with the naked eye from space; it can only be done with the help of high-precision, very sensitive optical devices. Chinese cosmonaut Yang Liwei, who could not view the Great Wall of China through a porthole, officially confirmed this fact in 2003.

The flora on both sides of the structure varies. This is found in nature under the influence of natural conditions: plants from different sides of ridges and mountains have different genetics.

Thanks to the rice polysaccharide amylopectin, the joints of the Chinese Wall blocks were unaffected by vegetation; the solution prevented the germination of spores and seeds .The Chinese authorities use drones to deliver food to distant sections of the wall and monitor vandals trying to steal a piece of the great structure as souvenirs.

The most dilapidated sections of the wall are closed to visitors. Due to vandalism and natural erosion, they may completely collapse in the next half-century. The Chinese authorities are trying to prevent this.