The Temple of HeavenThe Temple of Heaven is a worthwhile visiting place in Beijing. It is much bigger than the Imperial Palace (the Forbidden City) and smaller than the Summer Palace with an area of about 2 700 000 square meters. The temple was built in 1420 A.D. in the Ming Dynasty to offer sacrifice to Heaven. As Chinese emperors called themselves “the Son of Heaven”, they dared not to build their own dwelling “Forbidden City” bigger than the dwelling for Heaven.The Temple of Heaven is enclosed with 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 reflects an ancient Chinese thought of “The heaven is round and the earth is square”.The Temple of Heaven is divided by two enclosed walls into inner part and outer part. The main buildings of the temple lie at the south and north ends of the middle axis line of the inner part. The most magnificent buildings from south to north are the Circular Terrace, the Imperial Heavenly Vault and the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. Also, there are some additional buildings like Three Echo Stones and Echo Wall.Circular Terrace has three layered terraces with white marble. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties (1368A.D.1911A.D.), the emperors would offer sacrifices to Heaven on the day of the Winter Solstice every year. This ceremony was to thank Heaven and hope everything would be good in the future. Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests is a big palace with round roof and three layers of eaves, the roof is covered with black, yellow and green colored glaze representing the heavens, the earth and everything on earth. Another important building in the Temple of Heaven is Imperial Heavenly Vault. If you look at it from far away, you will find that the vault is like a blue umbrella. The structure of it is like that of Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests, but smaller in size. The vault was made of bricks and timber, with white marble railings surrounded.Three Echo Stones is outside of the gate of Imperial Heavenly Vault. If you speak facing the vault while standing on the first stone, you will hear one echo; standing on the second and the third stone, you will hear two and three echoes respectively.Another interesting and famous place for you to visit is called Echo Wall owning special feature. The wall encloses Imperial Heavenly Vault. Its perimeter is 193 meters.If you and your friend stand at the east and the west roots of the wall respectively and you whisper a word, then your friend will hear clearly what you say. Isnt it interesting? The phenomenon utilizes the theory of sound wave.天壇在北京，天壇是一個值得參觀的地方。它的面積約為270萬平方米，比故宮（紫禁城）大得多，比頤和園小。天壇始建于明代公元1420年，為祭天之用。由于中國皇帝自稱“天之子”，所以他們不敢使自己的住宅“紫禁城”比天的大。天壇被長長的圍墻圍著。墻里的北面部分是象征著上天的半圓環(huán)，南部是象征著大地的方形廣場。北部高于南部。這種設(shè)計(jì)顯示天在上，地在下，反映了中國古代人民“天圓地方”的思想。兩層圍墻把天壇分為內(nèi)壇和外壇。天壇的主體建筑位于內(nèi)壇中軸線的南北兩端。最宏偉的建筑物從南到北依次是圜丘壇、皇穹宇和祈年殿。還有其他的建筑物，如三音石和回音壁。圜丘壇是三層漢白玉構(gòu)成的平臺。在明朝時期（公元1368年公元1911年），皇帝將在每年的冬至祭天。此儀式是為了感謝上天并祈愿將來一切都好。祈年殿是一座大殿，圓頂，有三層屋檐。祈年殿屋頂都鋪上了黑色、黃色和綠色的琉璃瓦，象征著天、地和地上的萬物。天壇另一個重要的建筑是皇穹宇。如果從遠(yuǎn)處看，你會發(fā)現(xiàn)皇穹宇像一把藍(lán)傘。它的結(jié)構(gòu)和祈年殿類似，但規(guī)模較小，由磚和木材構(gòu)成，并被白色大理石欄桿圍繞著。三