 |
Great Hall of the People
West of the Square is the Great Hall of the People. This building, erected in 1959, is the site of the China National People’s Congress meetings and provides an impressive site for other political and diplomatic activities. Twelve marble posts are in front of the Hall which has three parts — the Central Hall, the Great Auditorium and a Banqueting Hall. The floor of the Central Hall is paved with marble and crystal lamps hang from the ceiling. The Great Auditorium behind the Central Hall seats 10,000. The Banqueting Hall is a huge hall with 5,000 seats.
 |
Monument to the People’s Heroes
The granite Monument to the People’s Heroes is just at the center of the Tian’anmen Square, directly upon the central axis of the old city. The construction started in 1952 and was completed in 1958. The magnificent Monument is 37.94 meter in height and built with over 17,000 pieces of marble and granite. It is the largest monument in China’s history. “The People’s Heroes are Immortal” written by late-Chairman Mao is engraved on the monument. Two rows of white marble railings enclose the monument, simple and beautiful.
The base of the monument is decorated with eight unusually large relief sculptures. They depict chronological events during the revolutionary period from 1840 to 1949. The sequence begins on the eastern side and moves clockwise around the base. These are the events shown in the carvings:
On the eastern side we begin with destruction of Opium at Humen in Guangdong Province from 1839-1842. Next is the Jintian Uprising in Taiping Heavenly Kingdom in Guangxi from 1851-1864. On the next side facing south we see the 1911 Revolution in Hubei Province, the May 4th Movement in Beijing in 1919 and the May 30th Movement in Shanghai in 1925. To the west the pictures are the Nanchang Uprising in Jiangxi in 1927 and the War of Resistance against Japan from 1937-1945. On the last side we see Grain for the Front; the Successful Crossing of the Yangtze River in 1949 and, last but not least, a picture entitled “Long live the Liberation Army!”
（Source: chinaculture.org）