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There was no masterplan or blueprint for a Great Wall. Each emperor built when and where he thought the Mongol threat was the greatest. Construction across northern China continued for the next two centuries. The routes through mountain passes that the Mongols used most often to reach China were blocked with walls. Those walls were then connected with other sections of wall.
In the western part of the country, walls were built of pounded earth, an ancient building technique. Peasants’ homes, city walls, even Qin Shi Huangdi’s first long wall had been made of pounded earth. In the dry, desert terrain of western China, earth was the only building material available in great quantity. It was simple to build with pounded earth. No skilled craftsmen were needed, just many, many laborers.
Toward the end of the Ming dynasty much building was done in the eastern mountains to protect the capital city, Peking. Builders began using bricks and blocks of stone instead of pounded earth. Walls built of stone and brick didn’t erode in wind and rain. They didn’t need constant repair as earth walls did.
Stone and brick walls were strong and durable, but they were more complicated to build. Progress was slow. Stone had to be dug from quarries, cut into blocks, and transported to the wall. Bricks were made from mud and then baked in kilns. Workers with special skills — stonemasons and brick-makers — were needed to handle the new materials.
Tens of thousands of workers were involved in building the Great Wall. The army provided many laborers. Soldiers became construction workers and generals became architects and engineers. Peasants were required to work on the wall. They worked for months at a time for little or no pay. Criminals served their sentences doing hard labor on the wall.
Even the most massive wall needed soldiers to patrol it. The Mongols were a determined enemy. If the wall was not guarded, they would find a way to get through. Many different kinds of fortifications were built along the wall for soldiers to live in. Some forts were large enough for one thousand soldiers. Watchtowers, built right into the wall, were sometimes so small they barely held twelve soldiers.
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The wall and the soldiers who guarded it were part of an elaborate defense system across northern China. Nearly a million soldiers patrolled the Great Wall, but they were spread thinly across thousands of miles. The Mongol warriors were outnumbered, but they had an advantage. Thanks to their swift horses, they flowed like water across the steppe. They could assemble anywhere, at any time to launch an attack and then disappear just as quickly back into the steppe. To defend against their fast-moving enemy the Chinese used an ingenious system of communication to gather soldiers together for battle.
Stone platforms, called signal towers, were built on high ground near the wall. When Mongol horsemen were spotted, a smoky fire was built on top of the nearest signal tower. The smoke was visible for miles, and when guards at the next tower saw it they built their own fire, passing the signal along. Sometimes loud cannon shots accompanied the plumes of smoke. The number of smoke plumes and cannon shots was a code indicating how many enemy riders were approaching.
The wall was shaped to fit the landscape it passed through. In flat desert areas it ran in a straight line. In hilly areas it twisted and turned like a dragon. The Chinese took advantage of the terrain to make the wall even more insurmountable. They built along the crests of tall hills and mountain peaks. The wall plunged down into rivers and then continued on the far bank. At the eastern end it ran into the sea.
By 1644, the Great Wall ran from Jiayuguan in the west, past the Gobi Desert, across the Yellow River, past Peking, all the way to Shanhaiguan on the Bohai Sea in the east. A Mongol warrior could ride for miles in its shadow without coming to a gate. And work was still being done on it.
The wall demanded great sacrifices of the Chinese people. The workers who built it were separated from their families for long periods of time. Many didn’t survive the grueling work and harsh conditions.
Life was no easier for the soldiers who guarded the wall. Winters in northern China were punishingly cold and the summers were dry and hot. They were paid very little, and had to grow their own food in order to survive. Farming was difficult in the dry climate, but they had no choice.
Even though soldiers were poorly paid, the wall was very expensive. Adding to it, repairing it, and patrolling it cost more every year. To pay for it, the Ming government taxed the people of China.
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At the same time, the cost of supporting the Ming government was increasing. Tens of thousands of people were part of the court, and more were being added all the time. Officals and advisors, well-fed and dressed in silk, spent their days quarreling and endlessly vying for the emperor’s favor. Paying for the extravagance inside the Forbidden City, or the palaces of the Ming emperors, placed another burden on Chinese taxpayers.
People grew angry at the extravagance and corruption in the Ming court, and at the taxes that were being imposed on them. Once again, peasants began to rebel against government officials. The Ming dynasty, which had been founded by a peasant, was now threatened by its own people. In 1644, an opportunity arose. A group of Chinese rebels stormed the Forbidden City and overthrew the last Ming emperor.
The world outside China was changing.
Once again lacking strong leadership, the Mongols were growing weaker and less united. Meanwhile, another nomadic tribe, the Manchus, had been gathering strength for years. They controlled a large area north and east of Peking and had conquered Mongol lands to the west. It was only a matter of time before they tried to expand their domain into China.
The Manchus waited. When rebels attacked the Forbidden City, they seized the opportunity. They quickly offered to come to the rescue of the Ming dynasty.
The Ming army gratefully threw open the gates and the Manchu forces marched through the Great Wall and on into Peking. The Manchus chased the rebels out of the Forbidden City, but they did not restore power to the Ming. Instead, they seized the throne and established their own dynasty, the Qing (ching).
Because the Ming dynasty had been disliked by many of its own people, it was easy for the Manchus to win Chinese support for the Qing dynasty. The combined Manchu and Chinese forces were far stronger than the Mongols. Subdued, the Mongols withdrew to distant parts of the steppe. Their fierce army, which had once so terrified the Chinese, was just a memory.
The Qing emperors ruled the land on both sides of the Great Wall. The Mongols were not a threat. The wall no longer marked a border, and it wasn’t needed for defense. Construction stopped and the watchtowers were abandoned. Traders and travelers passed freely through gates that never closed.
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Gossiping and scheming, as the two men at the lower left of this painting show, were as much a part of court life as beautiful silk robes and portrait painting.
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In 1644 the Great Wall was longer, stronger, and better guarded than it had ever been before, but for the Manchus it was as though it didn’t exist at all. They walked through it without a struggle and readily conquered China. The wall was meaningless.
But was it suddenly meaningless or had it been that way for a long time? Was it the wall or the Mongols’ own lack of unity that prevented them from conquering China again during the Ming rule? Was excluding the Mongols the best, or the only, way of preventing their raids? Would negotiating peaceful trade with them have been effective? Or even possible? We will never know. We can only imagine the fear that the Ming emperors felt when facing the
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Mongols, and how that fear influenced the choices they made in defending against them.
Looking at the Great Wall today we are amazed at its length, at how difficult it was to build, at the expense and effort that went into its construction. It was an extraordinary feat and the Great Wall has emerged as the most famous and enduring creation of the Ming dynasty. We are also aware that building it severely weakened the Ming government. Ironically, the greatest accomplishment of the Ming dynasty was an important cause of its downfall.