Temple of Agriculture () or Altar of Agriculture is a historic site in Xuanwu District of

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

, and located near the

Temple of Heaven The Temple of Heaven () is a complex of imperial Religious Confucianism, religious Confucian buildings situated in the southeastern part of central Beijing. The complex was visited by the Emperor of China, Emperors of the Ming dynasty, Ming and ...

History

The Temple of Agriculture was built in the 15th century. It was used by

Ming The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of China ruled by the Han people, t ...

and

Qing The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...

emperors to perform sacrifices to Xiannong ( 先农), the mythical Emperor Yandi (c. 2900 BC-2800 BC), who is said to have invented the plow, discovered the medicinal uses of plants, and created the first marketplaces. The temple's Jufu Hall was included in the 1998 World Monuments Watch by the

World Monuments Fund World Monuments Fund (WMF) is a private, international, non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation of historic architecture and cultural heritage sites around the world through fieldwork, advocacy, grantmaking, education, and training ...

(WMF) when it was in danger of collapse, and again in

2000 2000 was designated as the International Year for the Culture of Peace and the World Mathematics, Mathematical Year. Popular culture holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium, because of a tende ...

along with the rest of the temple. In 1998,

American Express American Express Company or Amex is an American bank holding company and multinational financial services corporation that specializes in payment card industry, payment cards. It is headquartered at 200 Vesey Street, also known as American Expr ...

provided funding through WMF for the restoration of the structure.Elaine Louie, New York Times, "Saving Endangered Art and Architecture," June 25, 1998.
/ref> Other structures on the site were subsequently restored, and the work included stabilization, wood treatment, repair and conservation of the tiles, and consolidation and preservation of the painted decoration. Today, the site has the status of Major Site Protected at the National Level of

In artwork

References

External links

Erling Ho, ICON Magazine, "Rites of Spring: Beijing’s Xiannontang, an imperial altar complex honoring the gods of agriculture, gets a long-overdue facelift," Spring 2004, p. 28-33.Altar of Agriculture (Xiannong tan)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Temple Of Agriculture Religious buildings and structures in Beijing Tourist attractions in Beijing Major National Historical and Cultural Sites in Beijing National second-grade museums of China