The Shenyang Imperial Palace is located at the old city center of Shenyang City in Liaoning Province.
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The Shenyang Imperial Palace, which is an excellently well-preserved cultural relic. In 1625 Nurhaci began construction on the palace and it was completed in 1636 under Abahai’s reign. After that, it was expanded in the Qianlong and Jiaqing reigns. It takes three hundred and thirty-two paces walking around the palace and there are eight gates. The streets in the city formed the shape of #. The palace was set up at the center of the #shape and was the imperial palace in the early Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). The palace was originally called the Imperial Palace of Shengjing and was renamed the Fengtian Xinggong (the imperial palace for short stays away from the capital) after the Qing Army entered the Shanghai Pass. Covering more than 60,000 square meters, it has over 90 buildings including 300-odd rooms and houses. Surrounded by red high walls and covered with golden tiles on the hall roof, the palace is richly ornamented and dazzlingly brilliant.
According to the natural layout and the sequences of the constructions, the Shenyang Imperial Palace can be divided into three parts. Main architectures on the east axis include the Dazheng Hall and the Shiwang Pavilion which were built when Nurhaci (1559-1626), the founder of the Qing Dynasty, began to establish the capital in Shenyang; the main architectures on the central axis are the imperial halls built during the reign of Abahai, including the Daqing Gate, the Chongzheng Hall, the Fenghuang Tower, the Qingning Hall, the Guanju Hall, the Linzhi Hall, the Yanqing Hall and the Yongfu Hall. On the west axis there are the Wusu Pavilion, the Jiayin Hall and the Yangxi Room, which were added to the palace during the reign of Emperor Qianlong of the Qing Dynasty. The Shenyang Imperial Palace is the second complete palace complex only next to the Forbidden City in Beijing.
(Source: chinaculture.org)
