Chapter 135: Atop the Forbidden City

After the auction, I suddenly felt the urge to visit the Forbidden City. I drove to the Palace Museum, bought a ticket, and hired a senior guide named Zhou Hui for two hundred yuan an hour.

"Is there any particular area you are most interested in?" Zhou Hui asked tentatively. "The Forbidden City is vast, so having a focus makes for a more worthwhile and efficient visit."

Zhuang Chen nodded, appreciating the thoughtful suggestion, and replied, "I am interested in furniture and cuisine."

Zhou Hui smiled upon hearing this. "No problem. We will make furniture and imperial gastronomy our main theme today. I hope you will return home feeling fully satisfied."

The group began the tour. Entering through the Meridian Gate, passing over the Golden Water Bridges and through the Gate of Supreme Harmony, they arrived at the square in front of the Hall of Supreme Harmony—the heart of the Outer Court. The three great halls—the Hall of Supreme Harmony, the Hall of Central Harmony, and the Hall of Preserving Harmony—stood on a nine-meter-high terrace. They were the most important buildings in the Forbidden City, serving as the venues where emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties conducted state affairs and held grand ceremonies.

"In the early Ming Dynasty, the Hall of Supreme Harmony was called the Fengtian Hall. During the Jiajing era, it was renamed the Huangji Hall, and it wasn't until the early Qing Dynasty that it became the Hall of Supreme Harmony. It is the most significant hall in the Forbidden City and holds the highest rank among all wooden ancient structures..."

"The interior and exterior decorations are incredibly opulent. The outer beams and lintels feature gold-leafed double-dragon colored paintings. Above the throne sits a gold-lacquered coiling-dragon caisson ceiling, and the six gilded pillars wrapped in relief-carved dragons near the throne reach all the way to the roof, creating a seamless, shimmering expanse of gold..."

Knowing her client’s interest in furniture, Zhou Hui focused her explanation accordingly. Upon entering the hall, she pointed to the floor bricks and said, "In the early Ming Dynasty, one tael of gold was equivalent to the price of 1,500 jin of fine rice, or the monthly salary of three county magistrates in the early Qing. Yet, in the Forbidden City, that was merely the cost of a single floor brick."

"The clay from the Jiangnan region is sticky but not loose, fine but not sandy. It underwent seven processes: digging, transporting, drying, crushing, pounding, grinding, and sieving, then left in the open for an entire year to remove its raw earthen nature."

"Soaked in the waters of Gusu, it was clarified through three settling pools, followed by six more steps—sedimentation, filtering, drying, treading, and beating—to refine it into a dense mud..."

"It was placed in wooden molds, where craftsmen trod on it with bare feet until it was perfectly dense. Excess mud was removed, and the surface was leveled with wooden rods, with the other side receiving the same treatment."

"After air-drying in a cool place for eight months, the bricks were fired with chaff for a month to remove moisture, followed by a month of thin firewood, a month of thick firewood, and forty days of pine branches..."

"Craftsmen would climb onto the kiln roof to pour water into the scorching heat to cool it down over four or five days. Throughout this grueling process, the slightest error meant the entire kiln of bricks was wasted."

"The bricks that emerged were still only semi-finished products. They then underwent carving, polishing, and soaking in tung oil; a person could only finish three bricks a day. Once stamped with the date, specifications, origin, supervising office, and the craftsman's name, they were shipped north via the Grand Canal, straight to Tongzhou."

"Finally, they underwent strict inspection by government officials. For every brick accepted, at least three had to be prepared as backups, and any that failed were destroyed!"

After hearing this, Zhuang Chen felt as if he were walking on gold. Zhou Hui smiled, "Of course, only palaces frequented by the Emperor were qualified to feature such luxury; you won't see this in most other parts of the Forbidden City."

"Through the complex and lengthy labor of nameless craftsmen, what was once worthless mud attained the value of gold. It took four years to build a magnificent imperial city, but it could take two years just to polish a single brick."

"This is true 'understated luxury'!"

They arrived at the center of the hall, standing before the most important chair of the last five hundred years. Whoever could sit upon it held the world in their hands.

The gold-lacquered chair carved with dragons—the throne of the supreme sovereign—was the only one of its kind. Within the 2,377-square-meter Hall of Supreme Harmony, and even the surrounding 30,000-square-meter square, there was no second chair.

All focus converged on the throne, held high by seven steps and surrounded by incense burners, incense tubes, and auspicious beasts. The cranes symbolized the Emperor’s health and longevity; the treasure elephants symbolized the stability and prosperity of the nation.

"The elephant, carrying a treasure vase, brings harvest and good fortune, embodying the phrase: 'Peace reigns in the land of elephants.'"

"The *Lu Duan* beast brings vast knowledge, showing that the Emperor, sitting on his throne, is all-knowing."

"The screen, which originated in the Zhou Dynasty, was placed behind the throne to signify the authority of the Son of Heaven."

Since close-up viewing wasn't allowed, Zhou Hui brought out photos on her phone to show the details. "The throne is exquisite, but because it lacks a backrest, it isn't actually comfortable to sit on; it doesn't even have armrests. It is carved with thirteen dragons, as if to constantly remind the Emperor that he is not just sitting on a chair, but on the entire world."

They then moved to the center of the hall, where six gilded dragon pillars created a shimmering, sacred space. These pillars were 12.7 meters tall and 1.06 meters in diameter, requiring three or four people to wrap their arms around them.

"For pillars this thick, at least two layers of hemp and six layers of plaster had to be applied before the relief-gilded gold patterns were added. Only one gold-leaf factory in Nanjing still preserves this craft today."

"Using 99.99% pure gold, after many processes, it is made into tiny gold leaves, sandwiched between 'black gold' paper treated with kerosene, and then beaten twenty thousand times. It takes six to eight hours of manual beating to turn one gram of gold into approximately 0.5 square meters of gold leaf, with a thickness of only 0.00015 millimeters."

"Once the gold leaf is applied, the six coiling dragons seem to dance in the clouds above the river and cliff patterns. The dragon heads on the three eastern pillars look toward the northwest, while those on the west look toward the northeast, echoing the golden dragons in the caisson ceiling. The coiling-dragon caisson, the screen, and the throne create a space defined by the dragon, highlighting the nobility of the 'True Dragon and Son of Heaven'."

She was truly a senior guide; everything she said was profound and sophisticated—a masterclass in subtle, high-level posturing.

"It’s not just the floor bricks that are precious; even the tiles above our heads are treasures!" Zhou Hui laughed. "You’ve probably heard of the Glazed Tile Factory, right? It fired glazed tiles for the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties. Emperor Qianlong likely felt it was too close to the palace, causing pollution and smog, so he ordered it moved to Mentougou in the western suburbs. Even today, that place is called 'Glazed Canal'."

"The molded tiles were glazed and fired again to achieve a vibrant luster, like glass. Different colors resulted from various metal oxides in the glaze. Red iron oxide glaze turns into yellow glazed tiles."

"Copper oxide glaze produces emerald green. Cobalt oxide produces blue, following the same principle as cloisonné."

"In the Forbidden City, where everything followed strict rules, colors were also dictated by the Five Elements, each representing a cardinal direction. Yellow belongs to Earth, and Earth resides in the center. As the Emperor resided at the center of the world, the vast majority of the Forbidden City’s roofs are yellow."

"The 'Nan San Suo' (Three Southern Halls) are in the east, belonging to Wood, which corresponds to the color green and represents growth. As the place where young princes studied and grew, their roofs are green. The north belongs to Water, which corresponds to black. The large rooms to the east and west inside the Gate of Divine Prowess have black roofs."

"Various shapes, interlocking and layered, extend all the way to the decorative tile-ends at the eaves. A hole is left on the back of the tile to be nailed down, preventing it from sliding. The glazed tiles across the entire roof thus connect into an airtight protective umbrella, shielding the palace from wind and rain."

As they walked out along the central axis, Zhou Hui mentioned that all the stone in the Forbidden City came from the Dashiwo quarry in the southwestern suburb of Fangshan, 90 kilometers away. The route for transport was long and arduous.

In ancient times, many wells were dug along the path. They were spaced very closely—one well every kilometer—a practice that puzzled the local people at the time, but it was actually the key to solving the transportation problem.

When winter arrived, the advance team would draw water from the wells and splash it onto the road, causing it to freeze. Workers, mules, and horses could then drag the giant stones, letting them slide over the ice.

Even using this method, the largest stone required over twenty thousand laborers and two thousand mules, moving only three kilometers a day. It took twenty-eight days of grueling travel to reach the construction site.

Placed at the northern end of the three great halls of the Outer Court, after being meticulously carved by skilled craftsmen, the largest stone sculpture in the Forbidden City was finally unveiled.

Raging waves, dancing celestial grasses, flowing clouds, and nine coiling dragons frolicking among them signified that the Emperor lived in a high celestial palace. The stone carving, weighing 200 tons, was placed behind the Hall of Preserving Harmony; it is known as the Cloud and Dragon Staircase Stone.

As they walked, Zhou Hui said, "Most of these giant stones, transported with such immense effort, were placed along the central axis of the Forbidden City. A hundred years ago, no one dared to walk on the path beneath our feet, because only the Emperor could pass here. It is called the Imperial Way."

Good heavens, Zhuang Chen finally understood what it meant to say, "The devil is in the details!"