In places where a clan’s compound faced the danger of attack such as the Hakka villages in Fujian, people built earthen buildings 土楼 (tǔlóu). Since ancient times, durable ceramic tiles were the favorite roofing material, but they were heavy. The eaves might overhang the walls by several meters.
The wide eaves also provided shade in the summer, and in the winter, the slanted sunlight warmed the buildings.Īs you can see in the picture of a building in the Forbidden City, in traditional buildings, the eaves were not supported by columns past the walls. This was to protect the building from weathering since wood rots much faster when it is wet. The builders considered it important to cover wooden buildings with overhanging roofs. On large buildings, such as this in the Forbidden city, roofs might overhang the walls by several meters.Ī noticeable feature of the traditional wooden buildings are the heavy ceramic tiled roofs with wide eaves and slightly upturned corners. These design features made the buildings resilient to earthquake and storms, and they also allowed for reconfiguration, expansion and reconstruction if the buildings were damaged. The basic features of traditional lumber architecture were a stamped earth base, load bearing wooden pillars that were not planted into the foundation, and slightly flexible brackets. The wooden architecture has distinctive features that changed little from the Zhou Dynasty (1045–221 BC) era up until early modern times when China adopted Western architecture. The thick forests then were a ready supply of lumber. In the environment of the river basins, the seismic activity and frequent flood disasters prompted the people to build flexibly using wood for most buildings. Along with survivability and ease of renovation, the buildings reflected and helped to propagate social order and religion.Ĭhina’s culture originated thousands of years ago along the Yellow River and Yangtze River.
The buildings were built to survive the frequent earthquake, typhoon and flood disasters and to be easier to rebuild. Each of these kinds of construction had different features. Since ancient times, the people built wooden buildings, structures built with rammed earth, and buildings and structures built with stone or brick. Wooden buildings had intricate roof frameworks. Since ancient times, several types of architecture have been traditionally built by the Chinese, and they are introduced here. Discover the reasons behind its features and how China’s architecture reflects Chinese culture. As of January 2020 the PRC has a total of 686 cities: 4 municipalities, 2 SARs, 293 prefectural-level cities (including the 15 sub-provincial cities) and 387 county-level cities (including the 38 sub-prefectural cities and 10 XXPC cities) not including any cities in the claimed province of Taiwan.įour cities are centrally administered municipalities, which include dense urban areas, suburbs, and large rural areas: Chongqing (28.84 million), Shanghai (23.01 million), Beijing (19.61 million), and Tianjin (12.93 million).Ĭhinese Culture: Customs & Traditions of ChinaĬhina has a unique and time-honored architectural tradition, dating back to the Zhou era 2,500 years ago. This unit will begin by looking at these traditional patterns, then consider how the great social and political changes of the twentieth century altered this system.Ĭhina is an extremely large country - first in population and fifth in area, according to the CIA - and the customs and traditions of its people vary by geography and ethnicity.Īccording to the administrative divisions of the People’s Republic of China including Hong Kong and Macau, there are three levels of cities, namely provincial-level (consists of municipalities and SARs ), prefecture-level cities, and county-level cities. In China, by Ming and Qing times, clothing indicated not only differences in class and gender, but also ethnicity, as the two major ethnic groups, Han Chinese and Manchu, wore distinct clothes. This unit will explore the role clothing played within Chinese culture. At any given time and place there are conventional ways of expressing meaning through one’s clothing, but over time these conventions change in response to changed political circumstances, technology, and fashion. By manipulating the same sets of signals, people can declare their individuality, indicate their beliefs, or signify their membership within various groups through how they dress. But in every culture clothing is one of the most powerful and ubiquitous forms of visual communication.īy using visual clues provided by clothing, people quickly ‘place’ each other, making guesses about the gender, social status, occupation, ethnic or national identity, and so on of those they encounter. To many, dress is merely a practical concern that warrants no more than superficial notice.
Clothing may seem like a mundane part of our everyday lives.
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