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Tiananmen Square (built 1949 onward)

Tiananmen Square, literally the "Gate of Heavenly Peace" Square, is named after the eponymous gate that sits at the square's north end. At present, the square covers about 40.5 hectares (100 acres), making it one of the largest open-air squares in the world.

Although Tiananmen gate was first built in the 1420s during the early Ming Dynasty, the original plans did not call for any sort of square to the south of it. Instead, Tiananmen gate served as the first point of access to the various gates leading into the Forbidden City to the north. When the Qing army unseated the Ming Dynasty in the 1650s, a detachment of Qing soldiers damaged or destroyed the original gate. When it was reconstructed in 1651, the new plans called for a square to the south of it about 1/4th the size of the present Tiananmen Square.

The square provided a convienient point of assembly for British and French troops who invaded Beijing in 1860. They considered burning down the gate and the adjacent Forbidden City, but instead decided to march on the Summer Palace and ravage it instead. The ruins of the Summer Palace and the destruction they wrought there can still be seen today. Forty years later, the square again became a focal point of military action during the Boxer's Rebellion, where foreign troops once again gathered their forces.

The square was not officially named until 1949 when the PRC took power. Mao Zedong used the site to announce the birth of the People's Republic of China. Nine years later, in 1958, the square was enlarged to its present size and paved over. The present site is flanked to the east by the National Museum of China, and to the west by the Great Hall of the People. The south side extends to the Qianmen (Front Gate), a traditional structure that lies along the route to the Forbidden City. The north side of the square is divided from Tiananmen Gate by Chang'an Avenue, a wide east-west boulevard.

Inside the square are two important monuments of note. First is the Monument to the People's Heroes completed in 1958, and the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong finished in 1977.