Submitted by Michael Kan on Mon, 03/01/2010 - 11:17
At 5:30am, the ancient town of Pingyao is a black mass that disappears in the darkness. There are no signs of street lights, save for the few red lanterns that dangle outside these still sleeping homes. The alleys here seem more like one long labyrinth, a giant shadow the seeable destination. Very quickly, I wonder where I am and if I might get mugged.
A few hours later, Pingyao begins to awake. And soon I find that nothing here resembles the modern China I know.
There are no high-rises in sight. No bustling shopping malls within town. In fact, there’s hardly anything over three stories tall.
The Palace Museum is housed within the Forbidden City, an imperial palace originally completed in 1420 that served a succession of twenty-four Chinese emperors and their dynasties during the Ming and Qing periods of Chinese history. It is located in the center of Beijing, the capital city of China. The museum itself was established in October 10, 1925, and is China's largest museum.
Built from 1406 to 1420, the The Forbidden City complex consists of 980 surviving buildings with 8,707 covering 720,000 square meters. It is recognized by UNESCO as the site with the largest number of preserved wooden structures in the world. The Mongol Yuan dynasty first constructed a palace on the site but it was ordered burned down by the Ming emperor Hongwu and the imperial captial was moved to Nanjing. But the capital was moved back to Beijing by his son Zhu Di and a new palace was built on the same site as the previous palace. Over a million workers labored on the new palace for 15 years, using Phoebe zhennan wood from the jungles of southwest China and marble from quarries near Beijing.
The Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art was constructed to house a collection of 3,000 pieces of art primarily from China and Japan donated to the University of Oregon by the family of Murray Warner. The museum was officially dedicated on June 11, 1932. Over the years the collection has grown to over 12,000 pieces that include works from Korea, Mongolia, Cambodia and Russia, as well as American and British pieces that demonstrate an Asian influence.
In 2002, after struggling with critical deficiencies in collections storage and climate control, the museum broke ground on a major expansion project that would more than double its size. Now completed, the new spaces have been used to provide a hands-on interactive discovery gallery, an art-making studio, a lecture hall and a new cafe as well as an expanded museum store and new staff workspaces.
The museum's Chinese gallery features decorative objects in jade, glass, bronze, and ceramic as well as ritual objects associated with Confucianism Buddhism, and Daoism; and architectural elements from the Forbidden City. Its display of imperial court garments including the ornate parade uniform of an Imperial Guard has earned the museum the distinction of being considered "one of the most significant public collections of Chinese costumes in North America."
The Manchu people of Manchuria, in northeast China, conquered the Ming dynasty in the mid -16th century and founded the Qing dynasty. The Manchus ruled China until the Xinhai Revolution of 1911.
The Manchu military used the banner system, an organizational structure first developed by Nurhaci, a Manchu chieftain who conquered the northeastern province of Liaoning and laid the groundwork for the conquest of China by his descendants.
These first three Banners, named the "Higher Banners" constituted the Imperial Guard. The Guard included 1,250 "Life Guards" whose primary job was to protect the imperial family and palace officials, 15,000 sentries who were posted along the walls and 10,000 elite soldiers to man the gates and provide escorts for the emperor and imperial officials who needed to journey outside the palace complex.
The men who served in the Imperial Guard were almost exclusively Manchu although there were some Mongols as well. Each banner was further divided into companies of 150 to 300 men.
Submitted by Mary Harrsch on Sun, 10/18/2009 - 19:01
Over six hundred years after the original Forbidden City was constructed in China, visitors were invited to pass through the vermillion Meridian Gate of a virtual Forbidden City, a joint project of the Palace Museum and IBM. The new virtual world not only provides visitors with the opportunity to marvel at the beautifully rendered architecture but examine cultural relics, observe and even engage in activities enjoyed by emperors and their families and learn more about the history of the Ming and Qing imperial dynasties.
I have not yet made my first visit to the real Forbidden City (it's definitely on my list of planned heritage site visits, though). But I was excited to get a virtual preview, especially from the comfort of my computer without enduring hours in the cramped seat of a 757.
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I tried every staircase but each time the avatar was prevented from mounting the dais. I smiled when I discovered this as the developers must have included this behavior to maintain the sanctity of the throne even in this virtual palace. After all, only an emperor with the mandate of heaven was supposed to sit upon it.
The Xian Forest of Stone Tablets was originally built in 1087. The Forest of Stone Steles in Xian holds a large collection of steles in China. The museum has a classical courtyard structure at the site of the former Confucian Temple in Sanxue Street, Xian, close to the south gate of Xian City Wall.
These three Imperial Tombs of the Qing Dynasty in Liaoning were recently added to the World Heritage Site designation given to the Ming in 2000 and 2003. Comprising the Yongling Tomb, the Fuling Tomb, and the Zhaoling Tomb, all built in the 17th century, the tombs were constructed for the Qing Dynasty's founding emperors and their ancestors. They demonstrate the precepts of traditional Chinese geomancy and fengshui theory and are richly decorated with stone statues, carvings and dragon motifs tiles. Illustrating the development of the funerary architecture of the Qing Dynasty, the tomb complexes meld traditions from previous dynasties and new features drawn from Manchu civilization.
Over six hundred years after the original 
