In 1403 AD, King Yan Zhu Di took the throne, and then decided to move the capital to Peking, and rebuild Beijing on the basis of the Yuan Dynasty. Since then, the Zhengtong, Jiajing, and Longqing years have carried out large-scale repairs and reconstructions on the city walls and other buildings in Beijing. In order to ensure the quality of the project, the court adopted a series of severe measures.
"Real-name system" facilitates "reverse investigation" :
When the city of Beijing was built, Emperor Yongle imitated Ming Taizu's method of building Nanjing City, and the official and private kilns that fired bricks and tiles were carved on the sides or back of the bricks and tiles. The name and production year of the kiln are also engraved with the names of the kiln owner and supervisor, such as "××kiln/kilnsmith××", “××factory/brickmaker××”, and “Daming Yongle×year”.
If the bricks and tiles are found to have quality problems during construction, they can be "reversed" according to the "signature" on the tiles. As long as it is verified, the lighter will be punished severely, and the severer beheaded. This "real name system" continued into the Qing Dynasty.
In 1981, when the ancient construction department carried out large-scale repairs to the corner tower of Dongbianmen, it was discovered that many bricks and tiles were marked with "Jiajing" and "Longqing" Ming dynasty and kiln names.
Before and after the process of continuous inspection layer by layer: When building Beijing, a building construction often requires multiple processes, so the "layer by layer continuous inspection" system has been implemented, that is, the craftsmen of the next process must inspect the previous process, thinking Those who are unqualified can refuse to continue construction and "report" to the inspector. If
constructs without inspection, it will be severely punished.
During the Jiajing period, the Guandi Temple was built in Jiumen Wengcheng to "enjoy it from all sides." According to the requirements, the foundation shall be layed out with one-foot-five three-layer soil, the soil layer shall be compacted three times, and the rammed layer shall be hard. But when the Guandi Temple of Dongzhimen was built, the craftsmen who made the Sanhe soil saved time and materials. They only laid two floors and let the masons continue the construction. They thought Sanhe soil was the lowest level, and the masons could not find out how thick it was.
did not want the masons but took a closer look, and found that the sand layer was less than one foot, refused to continue the construction, and "reported" to the inspector. Therefore, the craftsmen who made sand were punished.
The inspector sledgehammer beats at any time: During the construction of Beijing City, the emperor will select some officials to inspect the progress and quality of the project.
"Miscellaneous Records of Daming": In the tenth year of orthodoxy (1445), the Yingzong ordered the eunuch Ruan An, Cheng Guogong Zhu Yong, Xiu Wubo Shen Rong and others to supervise the work, and the east, west and south sides of the inner city were changed to bricks Build high walls. They contracted subordinate officials in pieces, and checked the quality of the project at any time. When these people go to the construction site for inspection, they have to hold a sledgehammer, and from time to time they pick up the sledgehammer to strike it east and west. When they hear which section of the city wall sounds wrong and is suspected to be ringing, they should check carefully. Once cutting corners or building structures are found to be unrealistic, they shall be punished immediately. Therefore, as soon as the sound of the sledgehammer was heard, many craftsmen were frightened and took extra care during construction.
Inspecting unfavorable officials to be punished jointly: The Ming Dynasty stipulated that once there was a problem with the quality of the project, the inspecting officials would be punished jointly and not tolerated.
"Trivia on the Construction of Ming City" contains: In the second year of orthodox (1437), Deshengmen, one of the nine gates in the inner city of the capital, was built. Deshengmen is composed of a tower, an arrow tower and a urn city, and is a building with a group military defense function.
Therefore, Ming Yingzong Zhu Qizhen paid special attention and went to the construction site for inspection. When inspecting the city wall, he made people break the mortar and inspect it and found that the mortar was "slightly muddy" and the "clearance was too high", that is, the mortar was impure and the gap was too large. Then there were more than ten craftsmen and contractors who were about to build the wall. Caught it.
The next day, many inspectors of this project, including the ministers of the Ministry of Industry, the "direct responsible persons" of Yingshang Shilang, etc., were punished. Some were dismissed from their posts, and some were punished. Subcontracting is strictly prohibited: When the city of Beijing was built in the Ming Dynasty, the “policy” of one contract to the end was implemented for some projects, that is, a certain project was contracted by a construction factory, and subcontracting and layered contracting were strictly prohibited. In this way, once there is a project quality problem, the contractor is the "first responsible person", which is convenient for investigation.
From the first year of orthodoxy (1436), the moat of the capital was deepened and changed to a stone-built river bank. Among them, the bank on the east side of Wenming Gate (renamed Chongwenmen in the second year of orthodox) was to be completed before the flood season. In order to catch up with the construction period, the construction factory that contracted this section of the stone wall privately subcontracted the 20-foot-long river bank to a construction factory in Tongzhou. And this construction factory cut corners during construction and caused the river wall to collapse.Many casualties.
As a result, the owners of these two construction factories were taken to the prison in Daxing County, Shuntian Prefecture, and were soon sentenced to "Autumn After the Fall", and the court inspectors were " Tingzhang 80" due to poor supervision.
Craftsmen need someone’s guarantee before they can “get on duty”: when building Beijing, there are also certain requirements for the skill level of the craftsmen, especially during the Yongle period. For a period of time, the craftsmen who participated in the construction were required to have a guarantor, especially the "three craftsmen" , That is, carpenters, stonemasons, and bricklayers, the construction factory or stone works guarantees their apprentices who have passed the "three years and one year" to prevent overfilling, and more importantly, to ensure the quality of construction.
The outer side of Beijing's city wall is made of bricks with crenellations, commonly known as crenellations, which are 1.9 meters high, 1.5 meters wide, and 70 centimeters thick. There is a crenellation every fifty centimeters.
According to legend, one of the sections between Fuchengmen and Xizhimen was contracted by a construction factory in Shandong. Inwa workers did not have enough hands. In order to complete the work on schedule, the contractor hired 10 bricklayers from the countryside to participate in the construction. But these people built a pig kennel and sheep pen to make do, and the technology of repairing the city wall was too poor, so the size of the pits built was different. These people only worked for one day before they were discovered by the inspectors. After questioning, it was confirmed that they had never "apprented to learn art."
As a result, the contractor was arrested immediately and sent to prison for guilt.
From today’s perspective, the series of measures implemented during the construction of Beijing in the Ming Dynasty seem to be too "strict" and lack a bit of "humanity", but they have deterred many craftsmen and inspectors, so they dare not dare to construct. Take it lightly, thus eliminating many "tofu dregs projects".
To this day, some of the preserved Ming Dynasty buildings in the capital, such as the Forbidden City, Zhengyangmen Gate Tower, Deshengmen Arrow Tower, palaces and temples, are still strong and intact despite the vicissitudes of wind and rain over a century.
