Monument to the People's Heroes

Coordinates: 39°54′11″N 116°23′30″E / 39.90306°N 116.39167°E / 39.90306; 116.39167
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Monument to
the People's Heroes
人民英雄纪念碑
Monument from southwest, 2014
Map
39°54′11″N 116°23′30″E / 39.90306°N 116.39167°E / 39.90306; 116.39167
LocationTiananmen Square, Beijing, China
DesignerLiang Sicheng, Lin Huiyin
TypeCenotaph
MaterialMarble, granite
Height38 metres (125 ft)
Beginning dateAugust 1952
Completion dateMay 1958
Dedicated toVeterans of Chinese wars 1842–1949

The Monument to the People's Heroes (Chinese: 人民英雄纪念碑; pinyin: Rénmín Yīngxióng Jìniànbēi) is a ten-story obelisk that was erected as a national monument of China to the martyrs of revolutionary struggle during the 19th and 20th centuries. It is located in the southern part of Tiananmen Square in Beijing, in front of the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong. The obelisk monument was built in accordance with a resolution of the First Plenary Session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference adopted on November 30, 1949, with construction lasting from August 1952 to May 1958. The architect of the monument was Liang Sicheng, with some elements designed by his wife, Lin Huiyin. The civil engineer, Chen Zhide (陈志德) was also instrumental in realizing the final product.[1]

The monument is 37.94 meters high, sitting south to north, from bottom to top for the pedestal, giant pedestal, the pedestal body, the top of the monument, the pedestal inlaid with eight large reliefs and two small reliefs, all to the theme of the major events of modern Chinese history. The center stone of the stele is taken from Laoshan Mountain, Qingdao, with "Eternal glory to the people's heroes" handwritten by Chairman Mao Zedong on the front, and the inscription written by Chairman Mao Zedong and Premier Zhou Enlai on the back. Since its construction, the monument has been repaired many times, and in 1961, the Monument to the People's Heroes was listed as a Major cultural heritage sites under national-level protection.

History[edit]

Preparation[edit]

After the liberation of Beiping, in September 1949, the first plenary session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference decided to build a monument to the martyrs. Initially, the proposed sites included Babaoshan and Dongdan Square, but Tiananmen Square was finally chosen. The delegates who made the decision felt that the revolutionary tradition of the May Fourth Movement was present in front of Tiananmen Square, and that it would be convenient for people to come and pay their respects. The conference also adopted the inscription on the monument, written by Mao Zedong.

Representatives attending the First Plenary Session of the People's Political Consultative Conference held the Foundation Stone Laying Ceremony of the Monument to the People's Heroes in Tiananmen Square in 1949

On September 24, 1949, a staff member of the CPPCC found the engraver Chen Zhijing in Liulichang, and ordered from him a copper lapis lazuli monument for laying the foundation stone, the pedestal was 2 feet high, the monument body was 5 feet high, 2 feet wide, and half a foot thick. on September 25, the monument's inscription was handed over by the staff member to Chen Zhijing and his brother. The monument was completed on September 29th. In the second day, the foundation stone laying ceremony for the monument was held in Tiananmen Square, with all the representatives of the first People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) present. The foundation stone was laid by the People's Liberation Army Military Orchestra, which played the March of the Volunteers and Wind Chimes, after which Mao Zedong read the monument's inscription. Then, all the delegates and members of the CPPCC filled in the earth.[2]

Shortly afterward, the Beijing Municipal Urban Planning Commission solicited designs from all over the country. By 1951, during the one-year call period, the committee received a total of more than 140 design proposals.[3][4] These designs can be generally categorized into three types - flat on the ground, giant sculptures, or towering monuments. The design forms of monuments include obelisks, monumental columns, and ancient Chinese monuments. These designs were finalized by the committee and were not adopted. The committee decided that the monument should be tall, and that only one of the two sides of the monument should have text, while the other side was temporarily vacant, so they asked Chairman Mao Zedong to inscribe the words "People's Heroes Forever", and Peng Zhen to ask Premier Zhou Enlai to write the inscription that had previously been written by Mao Zedong on the other side of the monument.[5] After that, the Urban Planning Committee got inspiration from the "Wanshoushan Kunming Lake" monument in the Summer Palace and the "Qiongdao Chunyin" monument in the Beihai, and formed a feasible design that could be eventually constructed, but the theme for the top of the monument could not be determined at that time.[6]

Construction[edit]

In May 1952, the Committee for the Construction of the Monument to the People's Heroes was formally established. It was headed by Peng Zhen, with Zheng Zhenduo and Liang Sicheng as deputy directors, and Xue Zizheng as secretary-general. The entire People's Heroes Monument Construction Committee has four specialized committees, namely:[7]

In mid-July 1952, the Historical Material Committee put forward the theme of the bas-relief program. The scheme consisted of nine panels, initially including Jinggang Mountains, Boxer Rebellion, Pingxingguan, Sanyuanli, Guerrilla Warfare, and the Long March, but the relevant themes were not finalized at this time.

On August 1, 1952, the construction of the Monument to the People's Heroes officially started. Monument stone mining from the Laoshan Mountain, the handling of seamless steel pipe billet bottom, with a steel wire rope and three tractors connected to the mountains from the Qingdao Railway Station, transported smoothly. Railroad department prepared from the small Fengman hydroelectric power station to transfer the train wagon can carry 90 tons. On October 13, 1953, the stone was transported to Xizhimen Railway Station.[9] The Committee then changed the design of the monument from south to north to north-south in order to rationalize the layout of the site for subsequent events. On March 6 and 7, 1955, the installation of the two monuments was completed, using two cranes with a total capacity of 30 tons in combination with a pulley block and a high boom. After the army surveying and mapping department enlarged the handwritten characters of Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai by taking photos, Liu Kaiqiu dealt with the burrs caused by the enlargement, and then gave them to the stonemasons to be traced and engraved on the center stone of the monument. The stonemason used high-pressure water gun to spray the mineral sand way to carve the inscription, after the completion of the carving and then gilt the inscription, and finally successfully completed the processing of the monument center stone.[9]

The construction of the monument was slowed down between 1952 and 1954 due to the failure to finalize the key designs for the top of the monument and the reliefs on the monument's body. On November 6, 1954, the Beijing Municipal People's Government Committee met and agreed on the design of the reliefs and the top of the monument, confirming that the top of the monument would be an architectural top and abandoning the idea of a sculptural top. The bas-reliefs, on the other hand, formed the final version of 8 large and 2 small. The work related to the relief was completed by Liu Kaiqu. By the end of October and early November 1956, the bas-reliefs were all made, and by August 1, 1957, they were installed.[10]

Commemorative Stamps for the Monument to the People's Heroes, No. 47, Issued in May 1958

The Monument to the People's Heroes was officially completed in April 1958 and unveiled on May 1 of the same year.[11][12] The monument cost a total of RMB 405,000 yuan to build.[13]

Structure[edit]

The Monument to the People's Heroes is located in Tiananmen Square, Dongcheng District, Beijing, the center is 440 meters away from the base of the Tiananmen Square wall, sitting in the south and facing the north, covering an area of 3,000 square meters, with a height of 37.94 meters. The whole monument is made of 13,000 pieces of granite and alabaster.[14]

On the pedestal of the tablet are huge bas-reliefs depicting eight major revolutionary episodes, which can be read in chronological order in a clockwise direction from the east:

  1. Destruction of opium at Humen (1839), in the run-up to the First Opium War
  2. Jintian Uprising, the catalyst for the Taiping Revolution (1851)
  3. Wuchang Uprising, the catalyst for the Xinhai Revolution (1911)
  4. May 4th Movement (1919)
  5. May 30 Movement (1925)
  6. Nanchang Uprising (1927)
  7. War of Resistance Against Japan (1931-1945)
  8. Yangtze River Crossing Campaign of the Chinese Civil War (1949)

On the front of the monument is an inscription in Mao Zedong's handwriting, which reads, "Eternal glory to the people's heroes!" (Chinese: 人民英雄永垂不朽; pinyin: Rénmín yīngxióng yǒngchuí bùxiǔ).

Epitaph in gold
The Monument, in front of the Great Hall of the People, 2016

On the back of the monument is an epitaph written by Zhou Enlai:[15]

Immortal Glory to the People's Heroes who laid down their lives in the People's War of Liberation and the People's Revolution in the past three years!
Immortal Glory to the People's Heroes who laid down their lives in the People's War of Liberation and the People's Revolution in the past thirty years!
Immortal Glory to the People's Heroes who, since the year 1840s, have given their lives in the many struggles to resist the enemy, domestic and foreign, to strive for the independence of the nation and the freedom of the people!

The time framing of since the 1840s was intended to encompass the China's modern history beginning with the Opium Wars, thereby framing the period of the 1840s to the 1940s as an anti-imperialist and revolutionary century.[15]

Commemoration[edit]

The Monument to the People's Heroes with the Great Hall of the People in the background, illuminated at night

The conduct of commemoration activities at the Monument to the People's Heroes is regulated by the Major Events Administration Office of the Tiananmen Area Administrative Committee.

After the National Day in 1959, Premier Zhou Enlai had planned to change the top of the monument to a material that could light up, for which the State Council collected dozens of new designs for the top of the monument for the design departments and colleges and universities across the country. However, due to the lack of better solutions, the revision plan was not pursued. In 1961, the Monument to the People's Heroes was listed as a national key cultural relics protection unit. Since 1980, it has been customary for visiting foreign dignitaries, to lay wreaths at the monument when visiting Beijing. [16][17][18]

Starting from February 8, 2006, to July 14, 2006, construction crews began to repair the pedestal and railing of the Monument to the People's Heroes, as well as to clean the bas-reliefs and the monument's body, and to repair the cracks. In 2014, in order to meet the 65th anniversary of the founding of the new China, the Monument to the People's Heroes was restored with a comprehensive cleaning and maintenance. In the same year, China established the Martyrs' Memorial Day, and on the day of the Memorial Day, Chinese national leaders were required to present flower baskets to the Monument to the People's Heroes.[19][20]

Article 7 of the Law of the People's Republic of China on the Protection of Heroes and Martyrs(中华人民共和国英雄烈士保护法) enacted in 2018 designates the Monument to the People's Heroes in Tiananmen Square as a permanent memorial facility to commemorate and honor the heroes and martyrs, and as a symbol of the spirit of the Chinese people and the Chinese nation's struggle for national independence and emancipation, the people's freedom and happiness, and the country's prosperity and strength in the modern era, and that the Monument and its name, inscription, inscriptions, bas-reliefs, graphics, symbols, etc., are subject to the law Protection.[21][22][23]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^ "The Monument to the People's Heroes". news.sohu.com (in Chinese). 2009-08-07. Retrieved 2021-07-28.
  2. ^ "人民英雄纪念碑的故事——人民政协网". www.rmzxb.com.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  3. ^ 中共江西省委. 党史研究室 (2009). 党史文苑 (in Chinese). 中共江西省委党史研究室. p. 8. Retrieved 2024-04-27.
  4. ^ 共和国要事珍闻 (in Chinese). 吉林文史出版社. 2000. p. 34. Retrieved 2024-04-27.
  5. ^ 在周恩来身边的日子: 西花厅工作人员的回忆 (in Chinese). 中央文献出版社. 1998. p. 323. ISBN 978-7-5073-0430-5. Retrieved 2024-04-27.
  6. ^ 永恒的象征: 人民英雄纪念碑研究 (in Chinese). 河北美术出版社. 2006. p. 99-100. ISBN 978-7-5310-2456-9. Retrieved 2024-04-28.
  7. ^ "人民英雄纪念碑的那些事儿 - 中华人民共和国国防部". www.mod.gov.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  8. ^ "人民英雄纪念碑设计的经过-清华大学校史馆". xsg.tsinghua.edu.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  9. ^ a b 闫铁英 (2014). "陈志德与人民英雄纪念碑". 中国工程咨询. 11: 77–79.
  10. ^ "Hero's sculpt in time". www.chinadaily.com.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  11. ^ "This Day, That Year: April 22". www.chinadaily.com.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  12. ^ "On this Day in Chinese History; 22 April". The Nanjinger. 22 April 2024. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  13. ^ "建造人民英雄纪念碑秘闻_藏趣逸闻_新浪收藏_新浪网". collection.sina.com.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  14. ^ "人民英雄纪念碑 - 北京市东城区图书馆". www.bjdclib.com. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  15. ^ a b Cai, Xiang; 蔡翔 (2016). Revolution and its narratives : China's socialist literary and cultural imaginaries (1949-1966). Rebecca E. Karl, Xueping Zhong, 钟雪萍. Durham: Duke University Press. p. 235. ISBN 978-0-8223-7461-9. OCLC 932368688.
  16. ^ "King Mohammed VI of Morocco lays wreath to Monument to People's Heroes (3) - People's Daily Online". en.people.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  17. ^ "Barbados PM lays wreath at Monument to the People's Heroes on Tian'anmen Square-Xinhua". english.news.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  18. ^ "Sierra Leonean president lays wreath at Monument to People's Heroes in Beijing-Xinhua". english.news.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  19. ^ "Xi pays tribute to national heroes on Martyrs' Day". english.www.gov.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  20. ^ "President Xi pays tribute to fallen national heroes on China's Martyrs' Day". news.cgtn.com. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  21. ^ "英雄烈士保护法(yīngxióng lièshì bǎohùfǎ): Law on the protection of heroes and martyrs". www.chinadaily.com.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  22. ^ "中华人民共和国英雄烈士保护法--中国人大新闻--人民网". npc.people.com.cn. Retrieved 28 April 2024.
  23. ^ "China mulls law on protecting reputation of heroes, martyrs - Xinhua | English.news.cn". www.xinhuanet.com. Retrieved 28 April 2024.

Further reading[edit]

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