History of the Forbidden City

Imperial Palace or Forbidden City was built in the year 1406 (Yongle 4 Year), and was basically completed in 1420 (Yongle 18 Year), which lasted 14 years. It was first built on the basis of the Yuan Dynasty palaces by the Emperor Yongle Zhu Di. It covers an area of 720,000 square meters (960 meters long, 750 meters wide), construction area of 150,000 square meters. It has 9999 houses, and the main buildings are the Hall of Supreme Harmony, Hall of Central Harmony and the Hall of Preserving Harmony. 

►Historical events of Beijing Forbidden City can be found in following table

1420: The construction of Beijing Palace was completed. The palace was on fire the next year and the
front three palaces were destroyed.

1440: The front three palaces and the Palace of Heavenly Purity were rebuilt.

1459: The west courtyard was built.

1557: The Forbidden City suffered a big fire, the front three palaces, Fengtian Gate, Wenwu Building
and the Meridian Gate were completely destroyed by fire, and until 1561, they were rebuilt.

1597: The Forbidden City again suffered a big fire, and the front three palace and the back three
palace were all destroyed. And all the constructions were rebuilt till 1627.

1644: Li Zicheng's army captured Beijing and the Ming Dynasty died out. Li Zicheng burned down the
Forbidden City before their retreat. The same year, Shunzhi Emperor moved the capital to Beijing f
rom Shenyang. After that lasted 14 years, the basic repair of the middle building had been finished.

1683: The repair of the rest buildings in the Forbidden City was began, and finished till 1695.

1735: After the Emperor Qianlong ascending the throng, he did large scale reconstruction and expansion
project of the Forbidden City in subsequent 60 years.

1813: Believer of Tenrikyo Lin Qing, leaded the insurrectionary army to attack the Forbidden City.

1900: The Eight-Power Allied Forces captured Beijing and reviewed troops in the Forbidden City.

1911: The Wuchang Uprising broke out, the Qing emperor gave up the throne but still lived in the Forbidden City.

1925: The Palace Museum was built on the basis of the original Forbidden City.

1949: After the stability of Beijing, the Palace Museum recovered to be opened to public. 

1961: Approved by the State Council, Beijing Forbidden City was designated as the first batch of
national key cultural relics protection units.

1987: Beijing Forbidden City was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List.

2005: The Forbidden City began its 19-year heavy repair.