The Great Wall of China

The Great Wall of China The Great Wall of China was a great tool for parts of China. The Wall provided the some of the warring states of that time a protection from the other states. Over the years the wall had been constructed and broken down. The wall was repaired many times and was made from many materials. Many lives were lost in the construction but it turned out to be a spectacular accomplishment. The Great Wall of China began construction in 221 BCE, under the order of the ruler at the time, Meng T'ien of the Ch'in Dynasty. Meng T'ien ordered the construction of the wall because there were many attacks from surrounding city-states. At this time they did not have the whole wall constructed. Later more was added on and many walls were connected to form the completed wall. Since the wall was worked on at so many different times and by different people it varied in its size throughout the whole wall. The Great Wall was described in Meng T'ein's biography: "Hebuilt a Great Wall, constructing its defiles and passes in accordance with the configurations of the terrain. It started at Lin-t'ao and extended to Liao-tung, reaching a distance of more than ten thousand li. After crossing the Yellow River, it wound northward, touching the

the Yang Mountains." (Cambridge 62) Although this wall was considered to be well under 10,000 li (one li is approximately a third of a mile) it was truly an amazing accomplishment.The building of such a massive wall was definitely going to prove to be a massive undertaking for the time. Through public labor laws and other ways Meng T'ien had of recruiting workers he was able to get together about 300,000 men to build the original section of the wall. Since the wall stretched through the wilderness, it was not easily accessed by construction workers and by supply lines. Due to widespread diseases and injuries there was a major life loss with the building of the wall. There is an ancient Chinese myth that says that each stone in the Great Wall stands for a life lost in the construction of the Great Wall. For the construction of just Meng T'ien's section of the wall it is recorded to of only took ten years to build. Today we believe that that is not true and it took substantially longer to build. (Kan)The wall was far from completed when only Meng T'ien's part was finished. Later other walls were added to and encompassed within the Great Wall. The last of the major work to be completed on the wall was during the Ming Dynasty around 1500 CE. The finished Great Wall extends around 1500 miles in an east-west direction. It travels through the four provinces of Hebei, Shanxi, Shaanxi, and Gansu. It begins in northern Hebei and ends in northwest Gansu. (Nancarrow)The Great Wall is built of many different types of materials, from tampered earth to granite blocks. The height of the Great Wall ranges from 15 to 50 feet and it has a base anywhere from 15 to 30 feet. Spreading throughout the wall there are guard towers along the entire length of the wall. (World Book)During the Warring States Period (475 BC - 221 BC) in China, there were seven states, the Qin, Qi, Chu, Yan, Han, Wei and Zhao. Of these seven states, three states of Q