30 Amazing and Interesting Facts about the Great Wall of China | Amazing Facts 4U
- The Great Wall of China is the longest man-made structure in the world.
- While the Great Wall of China is not one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, it is still included in the Seven Wonders of the Medieval World.
- In 1987, UNESCO placed the Great Wall on its list of the world’s great national and historical sites.
- That the Great Wall of China is a single, continuous wall built all at once is a myth. In reality, the wall is a discontinuous network of wall segments built by various dynasties to protect China’s northern boundary.
- The Great Wall of China was called “the longest cemetery on earth” because more than one million people died building it.
- The main wall is around 2,145 miles (3,460 km) long with an extra 1,770 miles (2,860 km) of branches and spurs.
- The widest section of the wall is around 30 ft while the highest point of the wall is around 26 ft.
- The length of all Chinese defense walls built over the last 2,000 years is approximately 31,070 miles (50,000 km) which is more than the earth’s circumference.
- Nearly 1/3 of the Great Wall has disappeared without a trace.
- The manpower to build the Great Wall came from frontier guards, peasants, unemployed intellectuals, disgraced noblemen, and convicts. In fact, there existed a special penalty during the Qin and Han dynasties under which convicted criminals were made to work on the Wall.
- Amazingly the mortar used to bind stones were actually made from rice flour.
- Numerous temples were built along the Great Wall for the worship of the war god, Guandi.
- The Great Wall of China is 25 feet high in some places and ranges from 15-30 feet wide.
- The highest point of the Great Wall is in Beijing at Heita Mountain (5,033 feet/1,534 meters). The lowest point is at Laolongtou (sea level).
- The most visited section of the Great Wall is in Badaling, close to Beijing, which was built during the Ming Dynasty. It was the first section of the wall to open to tourists in 1957.
- As early as the seventh century B.C., a number of smaller walls that served as fortifications and watch towers had been built around the country. Initially, each state that would be united in the first Chinese empire had its own individual wall.
- The earliest extensive walls were built by Qin Shi Huang (260-210 B.C.) of the Qin dynasty, who first unified China. Little of those earliest walls remain.
- Because the Great Wall was discontinuous, Mongol invaders led by Genghis Khan (“universal ruler”) had no problem going around the wall and they subsequently conquered most of northern China between A.D. 1211 and 1223. They ruled all of China until 1368 when the Ming defeated the Mongols.
- The dynasties after the Qin which seriously added to and rebuilt the Great Wall were the Han (206 B.C.-A.D. 220), Sui (A.D. 581-618), Jin (115-1234), and, most famously, the Ming (1368-1644). What survives today are the stone and brick walls predominately from the Ming dynasty.
- Since 1644, when the Ming Dynasty was overthrown, no further work has been done on the Great Wall except some restoration after 1957.
- Contrary to common belief, the Great Wall of China cannot be seen from the moon without aid.
- According to legend, a helpful dragon traced out the course of the Great Wall for the workforce. The builders subsequently followed the tracks of the dragon.
- President Nixon’s historic visit to China in 1972 dramatically increased tourism to the Wall. With increased tourism, sections of the Wall were restored, and after Mao Zedong’s death, the Chinese government recognized the Wall as a unifying symbol of the nation.
- The most famous section of the Great Wall, Badaling which is close to Beijing has been visited by over 300 heads of state the first of which was Soviet statesman Klim Voroshilov in 1957.
- The Jiankou section of the Great Wall, known for being steep and winding, enjoys the most appearances on Great Wall picture books and postcards.
- China receives more than 50 million foreign visitors to visit the Great Wall of China.
- During the Ming dynasty, nearly one million soldiers were said to defend the Great Wall from “barbarians” and non-Chinese.
- The last battle fought at the Great Wall was in 1938 during the Sino-Japanese War, which was between the Republic of China and the Empire of Japan.
- The Great Wall of China is threatened with erosion. The northwestern sections (e.g. in Gansu and Ningxia provinces) of the Great Wall are deteriorating very quickly and may disappear within 20 years due to demolishment by nature and humans.
- During the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976), many bricks of the Great Wall were taken away to use in building homes, farms, or reservoirs. Actually, the government actively encouraged it then.
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