大明宫
(dà míng gōng)

Daming Palace

Once world’s largest imperial palace

The Daming Palace, built nearly 1,400 years ago, was once the largest and most grandiose imperial palace complex in the world. Covering a total area of 350 hectares, it was four and a half times the size of the Forbidden City in Beijing and eight times that of the Louvre in Paris.

The palace was located at Longshou Plateau to the northeast of today’s Xi’an in northwest China’s Shaanxi Province, and for more than 220 years, it served as the residence and government center for 16 emperors and one empress of the Tang Dynasty (618–907 AD), a golden age in China’s feudalistic history.

Construction of the palace started in 635 AD. It was first called Yong’an Palace, originally designed by Emperor Taizong (599–649 AD) as a residence for his father, the first emperor of the Tang Dynasty. However, before the construction was completed, both Emperor Taizong and his father had passed away.

It was not until 662 AD — 27 years later —that the construction and renovation of the palace were resumed under the rule of Emperor Gaozong (628–683 AD). The emperor moved into the palace the next year.

With a perimeter of 7.6 kilometers, the palace spanned 1,500 meters east to west and 2,500 meters south to north. It featured 11 large gates and in front of its main gate, namely, the Danfeng Gate, there was a thoroughfare 176 meters wide. If it still existed, it would be the widest street in the world today.

Most parts of the complex were wooden structures. At that time, the Chinese architectural techniques for wooden buildings already were quite sophisticated. For instance, the builders employed large douɡonɡ, or interlocking wooden brackets, to support the extension of roofs and overhanging eaves, thus covering a bigger space.

In addition, the builders of the palace introduced a special system of column arrangements to increase the floor space of the monumental architecture.

Thanks to those techniques, advanced at that time, the main hall in the palace, called the Hanyuan Hall, covered a total floor space of 2,470 square meters, bigger than Taihe Hall or the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the largest structure in Beijing’s Forbidden City, which was built nearly 780 years later.

The Daming Palace’s fame was also linked to Wu Zetian, the only woman to rule China by her own right. It was where she ascended to the throne and exercised her iron-fisted rule.

Wu was first summoned to the imperial court by Emperor Taizong when she was only 12 years old. And because of her peerless beauty, the emperor named her one of his concubines the next year.

Not long after Emperor Taizong died in 649 AD, Wu became the empress of his son, the new Emperor Gaozong.

After Emperor Gaozong died, Wu became the Empress Dowager and she first deposed the next new emperor and then installed her youngest son as a puppet emperor. Wu herself became the de facto ruler.

According to the traditional Chinese order of succession, a woman could never ascend to the throne. In order to achieve her ambition of becoming the first empress regent of the country, Wu founded her own dynasty in 690 AD. Wu’s dynasty, called Zhou, lasted for 15 years until 705 AD, the year Wu fell sick and died.

The name of the palace was changed for several times in its history. But after the empress died, the complex became Daming Palace again.

Unfortunately, during the widespread wars in the late years of the Tang Dynasty, the once matchless, grandiose palace complex was burned to the ground. In recent years, a national heritage park has been built on the site. It opened in October 2010.

Pictorial dictionary

·　斗拱　(dǒu gǒng) bracket set

Douɡonɡ，or bracket set，is not only a unique structural element，but also one of the most important members in many traditional Chinese architectural structures.

Thanks to the interlocking wooden bracket, the eaves of some buildings could project out as far as more than 4 meters, thus providing vital protection for the wooden structure and mud walls from weather damage.

The bracket sets also provide a vertical support for the uplifted roof edges, or the so-called flying eaves, designed to let light penetrate into the interior of a building.

Most monumental buildings in the Tang Dynasty (618–907 AD) employed a big number of large douɡonɡ to support projecting and flying eaves.

Apart from its practical function, douɡonɡ had also been used in ancient Chinese architecture for its ornamental appeal. Usually, the more important the building was, the more complex the douɡonɡ would be.