Great wall of China

Great Wall has been one of the wonders of the ancient world. It is like a sleeping dragon spanning across almost the whole China. It is an object, which many legends revolve around. Some exclaimed it as “the only man-made object visible to the naked eye in space!” Some calculated the materials used in the wall are sufficient to build a small wall of eight feet tall and three feet thick around the equator.

Why Did Chinese Build Walls?

The threats of nomadic people in the north were constant throughout Chinese history. They were continuously raiding the Chinese northern borders. With every new ruler, came endless debates in the court on how to deal with those “barbarians”. Chinese had four options:

1) Initiate offensive campaigns to drive them out of the neighborhood.

2) Create defensive garrisons

3) Make diplomatic and economic ties with them.

4) Build a wall to keep them out.

All the above options were favored at various times. Experience showed offensive campaigns were too costly and risky, defense garrisons respond too slow to counter lightning attacks on a long border. The third option would be a very rational one, it was in fact tried and successful in couple of occasions, but generally the Chinese held themselves in a very high opinion, or the so-called “Middle Kingdom Complex”. They looked down upon the nomads as “people with animal heart” who live on the edge of the world. Any notion of them as an equal state was unthinkable. Thus wall building was the most favored option in many dynasties. There were three dynasties which built the most walls; they are Qin, Han, and Ming.