Ancient architecture tips - door studs

2018-12-23

The doornail is called "Zhuoyi" (sound clumsy Art) in Mozi · preparing the city gate. What does it mean? The ancient enemy attacked the city, shot arrows with fire, burned and broke the door. The ancients annotated it as a pointed round peg embedded on the city gate, or smeared soil on the city gate. "Zhuo" means water droplets, "Zhuo Yi" means to extinguish the fire on archery for military defense. According to the research of architectural archaeologists, the generation of door nails is the structural need of the door itself. In order to avoid the exposed nail marks from hindering the view, door nails are used as decoration. Later, door studs evolved from reinforcement, decoration and military defense to grade regulations.



In Chinese feudal society, the rulers attached great importance to the door nail, which was the symbol of feudal hierarchy. Zhu Yuanzhang, the emperor Taizu of the Ming Dynasty, once included door nails in the system of laws and regulations, and ordered Lang Zhang Chou, a member of the Ministry of rites, to specially research the type and system of ancient door nails. Because "there is no test for door nails", the Ming Dynasty only stipulated that "the main door is coated with copper nails with red lacquer gold", without quantitative provisions, and did not mention door nails to officials at all levels.



In the Qing Dynasty, the number of door nails and the materials used developed into an important form of feudal hierarchy. In ancient times, people called the five odd numbers of one, three, five, seven and nine days (Yang number), so the remaining even numbers were earth numbers (Yin numbers). Ancient emperors fooled people that they were the son of heaven and the son of heaven. Therefore, the highest number of days "Nine" became the exclusive use of the emperor and his blood related kings and grandchildren. The code of the Great Qing Dynasty clearly stipulates the use of door nails: "the prince‘s house is made of five main doors, with nine vertical and seven horizontal door nails; the prince‘s house is made of five main doors, with two of the prince‘s seven door nails (that is, nine vertical and five horizontal); the prince, Belle, Beizi, the Duke of Zhenguo and the Duke of Fuguo are the same as the prince‘s house; the male door nails are seven vertical and horizontal, and the male door nails are reduced to five five, all made of iron." What do you mean, simply put, that is, the door of the Emperor himself and the residence with which he is related by blood and relatives, and the door nails are nine vertically; Horizontally, the emperor is still the highest in vertical nine and horizontal nine. According to the distance, the emperor‘s brothers (i.e. Princes) use vertical nine and horizontal seven, and the emperor‘s sons, princes and Baylor use vertical nine and horizontal five. All the above are gold nails (copper nails); The doors of Yamen and government organs use seven vertical and seven horizontal, and the number below the Marquis decreases to seven vertical and five horizontal, five vertical and five horizontal, all of which can only be nailed; Ordinary people, if they don‘t want to lose their heads, don‘t use door nails.


▲  Picture of Palace Museum doornail picture of Palace Museum doornail


▲  Drawing of Prince Gong‘s house door nails

Of course, there are many types of doors in the Imperial Palace, the Royal Palace and other courtyards, which vary in size. Therefore, there are many ways to select door nails according to the situation, including seven vertical and seven horizontal, seven vertical and five horizontal, five vertical and five horizontal, etc., but the outermost door must be very strict in showing its status and identity according to the regulations and cannot be overstepped.


▲  Donghua door nail drawing (9 * 8)


▲  Close up of Donghua door stud (9 * 8)

Interestingly, the South (Meridian Gate), the North (Shenwu gate) and the West (Xihua gate) of the Forbidden City are all equipped with nine door nails, that is, nine vertical and nine horizontal, with a total of 81 door nails, but the East Gate (Donghua gate) is nine vertical and eight horizontal, with a total of 72 door nails. Why is the number of land (Yin number) door nails used here instead of the number of days (Yang number) door nails? So far, there is no detailed examination.




There is an idiom called "prosperity of people", which is associated with "nails", so you can see that visitors to the forbidden city like to reach out and touch those round door nails. In the Song Dynasty, people called the doornail "floating pivot" or "floating retting". Why is it called "floating pivot"? The first star from the Big Dipper is called "Tianshu". The original meaning of "retting" of "three points of water" is small bubbles. "Floating retting" can be understood as a doornail like a small bubble embedded on the gate. So let‘s ask you some interesting questions. Are the doornails on the Forbidden City solid or hollow?


The above two pictures are the so-called modern Chinese door design. The door head uses nine vertical and nine horizontal, which is at the same level as the son of heaven. Hehe, if you press the ancient system, I think this building should be called "so and so Palace". It seems that thousands of years later, in the new China of materialist ideological education, every common people still have the complex of emperor‘s dream in their hearts!

Note: the pictures come from the Internet and are only for learning and reference. The copyright of the works belongs to the original author and the company.
GEOMANCY