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Wellsprings

Beijing

China

Beijing, in northern China, is the capital of the People's Republic of China. Kublai Khan built it as the Yuan capital Dadu (Khanbaliq) in the late thirteenth century; the Ming made it their main capital in 1420, the year the Forbidden City was completed, and it was the Qing capital from 1644. The Jesuit Matteo Ricci settled there in 1601 with imperial permission and died there in 1610, and his collaborator Xu Guangqi later led a calendar reform at the Ming court that drew on European astronomy. In 1653 the Fifth Dalai Lama visited the young Shunzhi Emperor there, and the White Dagoba in Beihai Park was built to honour the visit. It is home to Peking and Tsinghua universities.

12 most-discussed ideas

Teachers who lived here

Works composed here

Ideas shaped here

Concepts most frequently discussed in the works composed at Beijing. Click any to trace the idea across time and place.

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