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Wall of Qin Shihuang

It is generally thought that the Great Wall was built under Qin Shihuang -- the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty (221-207 B.C.). Actually, construction of various sections of the wall started long before his time. During the Spring and Autumn period (770-476 B.C.) and the period of the Warring States (475-221 B.C.), China was divided among a great number of ducal states under the nominal, powerless central dynasty of the Eastern Zhou (770-256 B.C.). Seven of the ducal states - the Qin, Qi, Chu, Han, Zhao, Wei and Yan - emerged as the strongest. While these states fought among themselves and built defence walls against one another, three of them - the Qin, Zhao and Yan - had to cope with yet another enemy which threatened them from the north - the Xiongnu (the Huns). The three states to build walls as defense barriers along their northern borders and station troops there. This was the beginning of the Great Wall.

To reinforce the frontier defenses against the Xiongnu, the First Emperor gave orders to launch an enormous project - the building of the Great Wall. The walls originally built in the states of the Qin, Zhao and Yan were joined up and extended to form a wall of more than 5,000 kilometres. Cutting across the north of China, the wall started in east Liaoning on the east and terminated in Min county, Gansu province, on the west.

The walls of Qin are mainly consist of three part from east to west. Oiginated in Inner Mongolia, the east part, extended on the wall of Yan, winds eastwards across Hebei and Liaoning province. The middle from Xinghe in Inner Mongolia, stretching over the Yellow River Bend across Shaanxi is newly-built after General Meng Tian captured Xiongnu. Many castles and towers added to reinforce the previous one. Then, the west part starts in Gansu via Liezhao, Lanzhou and reached Yuzhong.

The wall made it possible to safeguard the lives and property of the people in northern China and to ensure farm production and livestock raising in the border areas. But its construction meant a heavy burden for the people. Hundreds of thousands of men, and even some women, had to perform backbreaking labour at the construction sites, and tens of thousands of them lost their lives - including conscripted soldiers, slaves, convicts and ordinary people.

Continued...........