Chinese+Architecture

The Great Wall of China
=== Walls are used in many cultures to protect its inhabitants and prevent unwanted visitors from entering. The Great Wall of China is no different. Once used for protection from the Mongolians, the Great Wall stretches 4,000 miles from Shanhaiguan in the east to Gansu province. The construction of the Great Wall began in the 7th ===

[[image:great-wall-9.4.jpg width="223" height="151" align="right" caption="A picture of The Great Wall"]]
===stone, concrete, wood, and earth, the wall once used for defense is now the biggest tourist attraction in the world. ===


=== Construction of the Great Wall began in the 7th century. The wall was built in pieces and was not fully connected until 221 BC by Emperor Qinshihuang of the Qin dynasty. "In 221 BC, after Emperor === ===Qinshihuang defeated the other six states and unified China, he decided to link up all the separate high walls.",(www.chinahighlights.com/greatwall/history). The materials used to construct the Great Wall varied from wood to stone. === === The main material used to build the Great Wall was stone and large rock. The stones and rock were kept together from either a concrete type mix or dried earth. "The wall was constructed by laborers comprising soldiers, common people and criminals.", (www.activityvillage.co.uk/the_great_wall_of_china.htm). Although the Great Wall of China is such a beautiful creation many lives were lost in the process. An estimated 2-3 million people died in the construction of the wall. ===

 The wall once used for protectio
=== n and defense is now used for tourists to visit and learn about ancient China. An estimated 50-100 thousand people visit the Great Wall each year. All these visitors raise lots of money for China. The money that China raises, because of the tourists, helps them to maintain the wall. Many of the tourists like to visit the wall during the summer and spring when all the flowers along the wall have blossomed. === === The wall that had been used for defense for so long has now been turned into a wall for tourists to walk along. China has held numerous events involving the great wall and has become one of the Seven Wonders of the World. The Great Wall is the most famous wall in the universe. By Christian ===

[[image:great-wall-of-china.jpg width="285" height="175"]]
Dan Mrs. Shal 12/28/09 Honors English

**//__CHINESE SHIPS WERE BETTER THAN EUROPE'S?__//** ===Have you ever seen a movie with really large ships with many sails and cannons? If you have then it was probably a European ship, but did you know that the Chinese made better ships a lot earlier than the Europeans? These Chinese ships were better because of three things; their great design, powerful weapons, and that many of them could be made in just a short amount of time. China’s ships sailed to many places around Asia and their sailors were masters of the sea. This Chinese oceangoing could not have happened though without their ships being built to perfection.=== ===Chinese ships of ancient times were some of the best in the world. They were painted with many bright colors and were close to the design of Chinese buildings. They had awesome sails and carried more of the m than ancient European ships had, letting them travel to far away lands. This better form of sail let the Chinese go on long distance sea voyages before the Europeans even left their continent. Even though Europe did make huge ships later in time, like you see in pirate movies, the Chinese were still the first to make faster and better ships. These ships would also===

[[image:ChinaZhengHeShip1405vsSantaMaria500pxw.jpg]]
===In ancient times Chinese weapons were the most powerful in the world. This is because of their design, and their deadly use in ship wars. One of these weapons was called the flamethrower, which could shoot fire at ene my ships from far away. The real key to success in defeating their enemies though was the Chinese weapon called the Cho-ko-nu. This weapon was a crossbow like the ones carried by knights in the middle ages, except this crossbow could fire a whole swarm of arrows at once! Just imagine what this could do to an enemy ship. “One hundred men with repeating crossbows could send a thousand arrows into their opponents' ranks in a quarter of a minute.” This shows just how deadly the C ho-ko-nu was at killing enemies, while on the other hand European ships carried merely one-shot crossbows. The Chinese also put these weapons onto their massive fleets (large groups) of ships.===

===The Chinese had some of the largest fleets in history. They went on voyages as far away from China as Africa. That’s a long way away! These ships also made a lot of money from their trips, which let them, buy more ships. These ships were made of wood and were all similar. They could be made in large amounts because of Chinas large forests of trees. So you can really see how china was able to make huge numbers of ships.===