The Temple of Heaven

(www.templeofheavenbejing.com)

The Temple of Heaven was completed in 1420 during the Ming Dynasty and was to serve as a Taoist temple. The Ming Dynasty during this time period "witnessed a tremendous amount of prosperity which produced a stable foundation for prosperity" through public works projects (Sporre 269) . The temple served as a place where people would come and worship the god of heaven and pray for a good harvest The actual complex itself covers an area of approximately 273 hectares, making this temple the largest architectural complex in the world for religious purposes (en.tiantanpark.com). In 1998 the temple was inscribed as an UNESCO world heritage site and now serves as a marvelous place for tourism (whc.unesco.org). This architectural masterpiece influence architecture through Asian for centuries to come. The Taoist ideology that was behind the architectural design of simplicity, exemplifies attributes are correlated with feung shui. I hope to someday visit this temple. Hope you enjoyed!

Ref: 1. http://en.tiantanpark.com/default.aspx 2. Reality Through the Arts, 8th Edition Dennis J. Sporre  3. http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/881