Datong Ancient City Wall

The ancient city wall of Datong was built in the fifth year of Hongwu in the Ming Dynasty. A major feature of the Datong city wall is that the outline is like a gear, the pier is protruding, and the trapezoidal structure is a special shape for the fortification of the Datong city wall. The existing ancient city wall was built on the basis of the old cities of Han, Wei, Tang, Liao and Yuan in the fifth year of Hongwu in Ming Dynasty (1372). . The city walls are all based on regular and well-organized stone strips, slabs and stone cubes, rammed with "three-in-one soil" and covered with blue bricks. The city wall is 14 meters high, 12 meters wide at the and 18 meters wide at the bottom. It is 6.6 meters wider than the Nanjing city wall. There are 62 gates, turrets and watchtowers on the city wall. There are four city gate towers, of which the south gate tower is a three-story building with a width of 61 meters and a depth of 23.35 meters. Four corner towers stand on the four corners of the city wall, especially the northwest corner tower, which is octagonal and called the dry tower. Among the 54 watchtowers, the Hongzi Tower is the watchtower, which is rare among other ancient city walls. At the same time also built 96 nests. About 40 meters away from the wall, there is a moat, 10 meters wide and 5 meters deep. There is Wengcheng outside the four gates, with a construction area of about 17,600 square meters. The Moon City was built outside the Weng City, and the Weng City was surrounded by a city gate. In this way, there are three door cards to enter and exit Datong City. There are also "arrow towers" or two-story "plaque towers" on each gate. The city has four gates, the east is called Heyang, the south is called Yongtai, the west is called Qingyuan, and the north is called Wuding. The watchtowers, turrets, gate towers and arrow towers on the wall stand at intervals. The moat suspension bridge, Wengcheng, Yuecheng, Guancheng, and Ercheng are heavily guarded. The city walls are tall and majestic, sturdy and steep, with tight defenses and perfect facilities. Because it occupies a very important position in the northern frontier defense and has played an important role in many battles, it has always enjoyed the reputation of "a strong town" and "the key to the north". A special feature of the Datong city wall is that its outline is like a gear. There are fifty-two protruding piers in total. It has a trapezoidal structure with a bottom length of about 23 meters, a length of about 20 meters, and a area of 400 square meters. Corner pier: slightly taller than the watchtower. Outside the four corner piers, each has a military control platform (or Wangjuntai), about 16.6 meters wide, about 15 meters long, and about 66 meters away from the corner piers. meters, and the pedals are connected to the city wall. A special shape for the fortification of the Datong city wall.