After the Battle of Jingnan, Ming Chengzu moved his capital to Beijing. Therefore, from the royal family to the scholars, on the one hand, they built large-scale mansions in Beijing, and on the other hand, they purchased garden industries in the suburbs of Beijing. By the Qing Dynasty, after hundreds of years of accumulation, the western suburbs of Beijing had developed into a district lined with gardens. Among them, the royal garden is the famous "Three Mountains and Five Gardens". Around the royal garden, villas and residences built by scholars are scattered, forming a unique scenery in the western suburbs of Beijing.
Since the Kangxi Period, the construction of the imperial garden has been concentrated in the western suburb of Haidian, and its location can be described as a profound meaning. According to the "Great Qing Dynasty Unified Chronicle", since the Beginning of the Yongle Period of the Ming Dynasty, there was a Nanyuan set up in the twenty miles outside the Yongding Gate of the capital, and its place was one hundred and sixty miles. Birds and beasts are released inside for the emperor's hunting entertainment. In the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, it was also often seen that the emperor shot hunting in nanyuan. However, the scenery of the South Garden is not good, and it is not suitable for the royal family to rest and rest. In the middle of the Kangxi Dynasty, the Kangxi Emperor wanted to build a garden to support his grandmother and mother, and it became a top priority to choose where to go. In the end, the emperor chose to build the "Changchun Garden" in haidian in the western suburbs. Today, we can also taste the wisdom of Qingren architecture from the site selection and construction of Changchun Garden.
Ancient Chinese architecture, the heaviest feng shui can be public opinion. If the mysterious elements are removed, the essence is to find the site according to local conditions. The so-called wind generally refers to the direction of the mountain, and the direction of the wind is therefore determined. The so-called water refers to the source of water. To this day, the site selection of buildings still follows the ancient system to a certain extent, and cannot be unregulated and arbitrary. It can be seen that the wisdom of the ancients has its own people who are worth learning from today's people, and it cannot be denied.
From the perspective of the architectural concept of the Qing Dynasty, first of all, the water source is the blood of the city and the garden, and it is difficult to survive without water. The water system of the capital has two mainly since the establishment of the capital in the Yuan Dynasty. One is the Chaobai River and the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal water system, which flows from the direction of the East Chaoyang Gate of the capital, and is the main road for the southern grain to arrive in Beijing. The other is the Sorghum River system of Kunming Lake, which was presided over by the famous scholar Guo Shoujing in the Yuan Dynasty, which led the waters of the Qing River and Shahe River from Beijing into the Urn Shan Po (present-day Kunming Lake), and then through the Sorghum River from the west to Beijing and to the West Sea (present-day Jishuitan). The Jinshui River in the Forbidden City depends on this water system. The land of Haidian was once an area of reeds and the ocean, "Haidian", that is, the land of the water's edge, because of the precious water in the capital of the Yuan Dynasty, it is often called "Haizi" in the land of water accumulation.
Secondly, the mountains are the topographic rush. The Jingcheng Mountains also have two main ones, one is the Yanshan Mountains and the other is the Taihang Mountains. The two meet in the guangou in the northwest of Beijing, where the famous Badaling Great Wall is located, just like the key to the lock of the capital. Not only is the terrain enough to arch Gyeonggi, but it is also a natural place to escape the heat on the side of natural conditions. Beijing's West Mountain, the remnant of the Taihang Mountains, is near the mountains, and the summer is far cooler than other places.
In summary, the garden in the western suburbs, surrounded by mountains and rivers, and the mountains and lakes are not only convenient for water diversion, but also have beautiful scenery and pleasant climate. Therefore, since the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, there have been dignitaries and nobles who have built villas here to cool off. For example, in the Ming Dynasty, When Mi Wanzhong built the Spoon Garden (in present-day Peking University), there is a sentence that "I prefer the bright moon night of the tall building, and leisurely put the wine on the West Mountain". The elegant and elegant style and leisurely swimming in the forest spring can be seen. In addition, in ancient China, there was a saying that "the sky tilted to the northwest and the earth sank to the southeast", and ancient books such as Huainan Zi were contained. Therefore, the ancients had the idea that the northwest was the end of the heavens and the pole of the universe. Royal architecture, whose symbolism often precedes practical value. Taking the Forbidden City as an example, the architectural pattern imitates the Purple Micro Star Wall in the air. Therefore, the Kangxi Emperor built changchun garden in the western suburbs, in addition to the convenience of natural conditions, there is no lack of traditional thinking that secretly conforms to the heavens and the induction of heaven and man.
In the process of construction of Changchun Garden, it also reflects the essence of traditional Chinese garden architecture concepts. The designer and presiding builder of Changchun Garden, according to Mr. Cao Xun's research, are the same as the Yuquan Mountain Jingming Garden and Zhongnanhai Yingtai, and they are all famous garden builders in the Qing Dynasty - Zhang Ran, a native of Songjiang Province. After Zhang Ran's death, the renovation and addition of Changchun Garden in the 28th to 30th years of the Kangxi Dynasty was presided over by ye Tao, a landscape painter and a native of Qingpu. The two builders are representatives of the landscape art of China's southern school of gardening, Zhang Nanyuan, the father of the Zhang family, is a famous gardening master in China, who has presided over the construction of Hengyun Villa, Zhuting Lake Villa, Fushui Villa and other private villas in Jiangnan. Zhang Jiashi lived in Beijing, served the Qing court royalty, and moved the world with the name of rockery stacking technology, known as "Shanzi Zhang". Ye Tao is also not a generalist, and is a representative of the Xin'an School of Landscape Painting in the Qing Dynasty.
Chen summed up the main points of gardening from Mr. Zhou's "Zi Weng Says Garden", and there is a theory that "the mountain is not high, but the level is high; the water is not deep, and the expensive has twists and turns". At the same time, it is believed that there must be mountains and rivers in the garden, but the mountains and waters cannot be divided. Changchun Garden first fixed the water source, and then with the "Shan Zi Zhang" design that is good at Stacking Mountain, which is in line with this kind of gardening theory. There is a note in the history of the wilderness that changchun garden was built for the Kangxi Emperor to go down to Jiangnan, and the landscape garden of The South Of the River was beautiful, so it was built according to the same. Whether this is true or not, Changchun Garden is presided over by the southern school architects, introducing the Wuzhong Jiangsu and Zhejiang art gardening style, melting the natural artificial scenery into a furnace, which is undoubtedly righteous.
However, as a royal garden, the layout and planning of Changchun Garden are more magnificent than the private gardens in the south. According to the Qianlong period of the book "The Old Wen Kao under the Sun", Changchun Garden set up five palace gates, planned as the east, middle and west three roads, regulating the layout of the palace in accordance with the Qing Dynasty, covering an area of about 60 hectares, and mainly water features. Such boldness is by no means within the reach of private courts. Therefore, Changchun Garden's mixed Jiangnan garden is elegant and compact, and the atmosphere of the royal palace is strict, opening the "Three Mountains and Five Gardens" to create a precedent, and the artistic achievements and architectural wisdom are worth exploring by future generations.
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