Length of the Chinese Wall in km on the map. Chinese Wall brief information
The Great Wall of China is a symbol of the pride and greatness of the Chinese nation, a symbol of the centuries-old struggle against barbarian nomads. In honor of this architectural monument, the national athletics marathon “The Great Wall” is held every year. Marathon runners run part of the distance along one of the well-preserved sections of the Great Wall.
However, there are “pearls” that few people know about, namely the closed part of the Chinese wall. This site can be reached from the nearby village. In most places there will be warning signs of danger. When choosing an enclosed area, you are faced with many difficulties: overgrown with dense bushes, broken steps that prevent stable foot placement, climbing over several meters and walls, crossing chasms, steep climbs with unstable surfaces.
Considering we both loaded our backpacks. Trekking is necessary, but you need to go through it wisely and balance your strengths because you will not see a person who can help you. Finding the way off the wall is a real challenge. During the entire trekking, somewhere in the middle we saw a slightly visible path.
History of construction
Construction of the Great Wall of China began in the 3rd century BC to protect against raids by nomads, as well as to clearly mark the borders of the Chinese Empire. About a million people were employed in the construction of the wall. In the 2nd century BC, the Chinese Empire was finally formed as a single whole, and the construction of the Great Wall acquired a new scope: old sections were strengthened, built on, and extended. Thanks to the joint efforts of slaves, soldiers and landowners, the work was completed within 10 years.The parameters of the wall differed from site to site, but on average they were: width 5.5 m, height 7.5 m, height with battlements 9 m. Numerous towers and signal towers were built into the wall. The distance between the towers is 200 m, equal to the flight range of the arrow. The distance between signal towers is 10 km, within sight of the fire. There were also 12 gates in the wall, which later turned into well-fortified outposts. A system of ditches or ditches was built around the most dangerous sections of the wall.
Remember that wall trekking, especially with a backpack, requires fitness - it is not a spring break. Great Chinese Wall was built by overlapping stones and bricks, along with stories and legends that have passed through the years and still reach the ears of people. The Maratanas, women who sought their husbands to climb hundreds of kilometers to the Great Wall of China, have a reputation for being the most ambitious man-made construction.
The purpose of the Great Wall of China was to protect against invasion by the Turks, Mongols and other nomadic tribes from what is now modern Mongolia and Manchuria. Another important purpose of the wall was to provide closer control over customs and introduce transport regulations on Silk Road.
During the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), a line of watchtowers was built deep into the desert to protect caravans from nomads. These later buildings are the best preserved to this day.
Beginning during the reign of the Qin Dynasty (1644-1911), the wall began to quickly collapse under the influence of time. Only a small area near Beijing received the attention of the authorities and concern for its preservation. Many areas were destroyed due to vandalism, many were dismantled for building materials.
The Great Wall today
However, since 1984, the Chinese government has adopted a program to restore the Great Wall of China as a cultural heritage. Restoration and restoration is financed by the state, Chinese and foreign firms and companies, and private individuals.The Great Wall is currently included in the list World Heritage UNESCO and is China's greatest historical landmark. A section of the wall near Beijing has been restored and is open to tourists. Every year it is visited by more than 40 million guests from different countries.
However the main role The building was important due to the observation towers, garrisons located along the walls, and the fire or smoke alarms that were used at the time. The passage between the walls of the Great Wall also served as a means of transportation.
The first fortifications of the Great Wall were built before the creation of the Chinese Empire. They were aimed at protecting against mutual attacks between tribes. The stone used in the construction was layered and the mortar was made from limestone burned with starch mixed with rice starch. In fact, the first buildings of the Wall, before they reached the breadth and recognition of our time, were made of clay, not at all resistant to the passage of time.
When laying the stone blocks of the Great Wall, a mixture of slaked lime and glutinous rice porridge was used.
There is an opinion that the Great Wall of China is clearly visible from space. However, it is not. It is impossible to see the wall with the naked eye from a spaceship. In photographs taken from a height of 160 km, the wall is barely visible, and only when ideal conditions photographing. However, the use of devices with glass lenses gives very poor results.
Among the Chinese, the Great Wall was called the Great Cemetery during construction because huge amount construction workers who died during its construction. By different estimates, on the troika, from 300 thousand to a million people died. There is a legend that the dead were walled up directly into the wall so that human bones strengthen the structure. But studies of the destroyed walls showed that there were no human remains in them.
The wall, built during the Ming Dynasty, stretches for thousands of kilometers, from the city of Shanhaiguan Qinhuangdao, Hebei, in the east to Lop Lake in the west. The wall borders southern region Inner Mongolia. Almost a thousand kilometers consists of 259 kilometers of actual wall, 359 kilometers of ditch and 232 kilometers of natural protective barriers such as hills and rivers. According to the latest measurements, the Great Wall of China has a total length of more than 196 kilometers.
Unfortunately, currently only 8.2% of the Great Wall remains intact, and 74.1% of the structure is damaged. This had several reasons: firstly, natural factors- wind, repeated frost-thaw cycles - destroyed construction; Secondly, some shopkeepers practice selling small portions of the wall as a souvenir for tourists; Third, due to the deterioration of the structure, some residents of nearby villages see the Chinese Wall as a large source of stone for building houses and roads.
The Great Wall of China is a chain of defensive structures stretching across Northern China from the Liaodong Bay of the Yellow Sea to the sands of the Gobi Desert.
The length of the Chinese wall in a straight line, from edge to edge, is 2,450 km, and if we take into account all the bends and branches, then, according to various estimates, it turns out to be from 6,000 to 8,850 km. The most visited sections of the wall by tourists - Badaling and Simatai - are located in the vicinity of Beijing. This grand fortification is the most recognizable symbol of China. The inscription made by Mao Tse-Tung at the entrance to the reconstructed part of the monument reads: “If you have not visited Great Wall, you are not a real Chinese.” In the Chinese imagination, the winding stone fortress resembles a flying dragon in its outline, which helps turn the Chinese wall into a national symbol.
In addition, more than 60 kilometers from the Great Wall, near Gansu, will probably disappear from the face of the Earth in about 20, due to sand storms. The height of the wall has already fallen by five meters, and some areas have been badly damaged by landslides. Tourist areas of the Great Wall.
Some sections of the Great Wall of China, especially near the capital, Beijing, are open to visitors. The entrance is from the north, which in the past was manned by guards, which also ensured the protection of Beijing. Made of stone and brick, this section of the Great Wall is 7.8 meters high and 5 meters wide.
Construction of the Millennium
The idea of creating the Great Wall of China is attributed to Emperor Qin Shi Huang. He united the disparate kingdoms warring among themselves, establishing sole dominance in the territory of China. Since the rulers of small kingdoms fought with each other for many centuries (475-221 BC), they were the first to build defensive structures. And although the dictator Qin Shi Huang erased the borders of states from the face of the Earth, their walls remained, and then he conceived the construction of the millennium. According to the emperor's plan, the Great Wall of China was supposed to clearly define the borders Chinese civilization, strengthen the won unity and protect China from raids by nomads from the north. 
Construction, which began in 210 BC, continued with minor interruptions until the end of the Ming dynasty, that is, until the 1640s. At this time, the Chinese wall acquired modern look through reconstruction - untreated stone boulders in some areas were replaced with bricks and stone slabs.
The entrance is from the west, which is located near the western end of the Great Wall of China. Shanhaiguan Entrance, located on the eastern edge of the wall. A section of the Great Wall of Ming where the steep slopes descend for eleven kilometers. Is the Great Wall visible on the Moon?
Despite possible images taken of the Great Wall on the Moon or in space, they have no bearing on deciding whether the fortification is visible to the naked eye, since cameras have a resolution and the ability to magnify images far beyond the human eye.
The Chinese Wall - the pride of ancient China
Winding between mountains and valleys, the Great Wall of China stretches for more than 6,000 km. According to legend, the winged horse of Emperor Shi Huang ran exactly this distance in one day. In those places where the horse hit the ground with its hoof, watchtowers appeared. In reality, the towers were built at regular intervals; each of them was equal to two flights of an arrow fired from a bow. Thus, the Chinese could shoot at any section of the wall, which ensured good border security. Garrison and signal towers were also installed, from which, in the event of an attack, warning signals were sent by fire or drumming. The news of an enemy invasion from one end of the wall to the other could be transmitted in just 24 hours! Average height the wall reached 7.8 meters, and its width allowed five infantrymen to march in a row or five horsemen to ride in a line.
The wall is the most important symbol of China. In 246 BC. Lord, the young prince was 13 years old and more afraid of death. He orders the subjects to build their own tomb, which is an actual mausoleum. The structure is 115 feet high and is surrounded by various pitfalls so that enemies cannot loot the wealth from within. At that time there were six states in China. He was the lord of one of them, and the conflicts were often bloody.
He starts a war with other states, which he will defeat and form an empire. He issued a number of laws that were considered not to be modeled on Chinese civilization at the time. He abolished feudalism, introduced a unique currency, harmonized the letter, maintaining 450 letters.
"Wall of Bones"
It is impossible to estimate how many people died building the Great Wall of China. The Chinese say: “Every stone in the wall is someone’s life.” About 1 million people worked at the legendary construction site. Offending workers were executed on the spot, and their bodies were buried at the base of an earthen rampart. Many years later, archaeologists have repeatedly discovered human remains here. Perhaps the chilling findings gave rise to the legend that the court sorcerer predicted to Shi Huang that the Great Wall of China would be completed only when 10,000 inhabitants of the Celestial Empire were buried under it or one man named Wang died. Then the emperor ordered to find a man with that name, kill him and wall him up in the wall. The same fate befell the Chinese who died at a construction site from exhaustion. They were buried in a vertical position under the wall. There is a belief that if you put your ear to the wall, you can hear the plaintive moans and cries of people who died at a construction site.
Despite all the reform laws, he was proud of power, pride and had gigantic architectural projects. All this was done on the downside of people with very high taxes. Wanting to be eternal, immortal, he consumed arsenic and mercury daily and was very interested in the occult. His close friends advised to unite 270 palaces with secret corridors. If one of the subjects met the emperor during his long walks through these palaces, he was killed. Death became an obsession for him.
The occult initiator tells him that he will have to build a wall to protect him from death. Danger will come from the north, the prophet said, and a wall must be built in this area. The construction of the wall began as a raw material, the Chinese used soil mixed with rice. This mixture hardened and some kind of cement appeared.