The Temple of Heaven, located in the Chongwen District, Beijing, China.
The Temple of Heaven is an imperial complex of religious buildings in Beijing China. The complex was visited by the Emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties for annual ceremonies of prayer to Heaven for good harvest.
Built in 1420, it was enlarged and rebuilt during the reigns of the Ming emperor Jiajing and the Qing emperor Qianlong and in 1988 it was opened to the public as a park.
Covering an area of 2,700,000 square meters,
The temple is enclosed by a long wall. The northern part within the wall is semicircular symbolizing the heavens and the southern part is square symbolizing the earth. The northern part is higher than the southern part. This design shows that the heaven is high and the earth is low and the design reflected an ancient Chinese thought of ‘the heaven is round and the earth is square’.