While fancy new Olympic venues are being erected across Beijing, more and more scaffolds have also appeared around its many ancient, historical sites as the Chinese capital is moving to protect its cultural heritage.

A number of ancient palaces, temples, imperial gardens, residences of the nobility and imperial tombs, which have undergone centuries of wear and tear, have received repairs in the past few years and many other projects now are under way in the hope of impressing the millions of athletes and tourists who are expected to pour into the city in 2008.

Three ancient structures in northwestern Beijing's world-renowned Summer Palace, a resort for Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) royalty, included in the city's multi-million-dollar renovations, were reopened to tourists in late September after a 630-day repair period.

The Hall of Dispelling Clouds, the Tower of Buddhist Incense and the Long Corridor of the Summer Palace were restored at a cost of about 60 million yuan (US$7.5 million).

New guarding monitors, fireproof facilities and water-electricity supply systems have been installed, in what so far has been the most extensive and complete renovation of it in the last century.

This year is the fourth in the city's Humanism Olympic Cultural Heritage Protection Plan. In the wake of a 330 million yuan (US$41 million) maintenance project from 2000 to 2002, the Beijing Municipal Government decided to invest another 600 million yuan (US$75 million) between 2003 and 2007, or 120 million yuan (US$15 million) each year, to repair historical sites around the city.

The expenditure on heritage protection in a single year at present comes close to matching the city's total spent in the 1990s, according to the Beijing Municipal Administration of Cultural Heritage.

"Beijing has entered an unprecedented era of heritage protection and rehabilitation," said Wang Yuwei, head of the Heritage Protection Division under the administration.

He said nearly 200 historical sites around the city, including popular landmarks like the Great Wall and the Forbidden City, have been or are being repaired. In the next two years, the maintenance work will cover dozens of other cultural relics in the city.

"Before the 2008 Olympic Games, all the heritage sites under State and municipal-level protection in Beijing will be repaired," Wang said. "It was unimaginable in the past to repair so many heritage sites in such a short period of time. The Olympic Games are helping us make a record in the history of heritage protection."

After years of headlong economic development, Beijing is becoming dominated by skyscrapers and shopping centers. Across the city, many cultural heritage sites are at risk of disappearing under the tidal wave of urbanization.

"But the country and city leaders now have a deeper understanding of the importance of cultural heritage," said Kong Fanzhi, director of the heritage administration. "The old city of Beijing, which has suffered overwhelming shocks of modernization in the past half-century, will be protected as a whole. Preservation is now given priority over modernization in this area."

The old city that Kong mentioned refers to the original area laid out in the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing dynasties -- comprising the 62.5-square-kilometre area within the Second Ring Road where the city wall and moat used to be.

Kong said his administration is drafting a long-term city heritage protection plan to last from 2008 to 2015. "It is impossible to repair all the historical sites in Beijing before 2008. We are not only doing this for the Olympic Games.

"After the Games, we will start to revamp the cultural relics under district-level protection. About 100 such historical sites will be repaired by the end of 2010," Kong said.

Old courtyards

The Beijing municipal government has listed 658 ancient courtyards as valuable relics for protection, and hung "blue plaques" over the gate of each courtyard to rescue them from destruction.

Courtyards with the blue plaques are not allowed to be demolished or damaged in any restoration projects, said Zhang Mao, vice-mayor of Beijing, when he nailed the plaques at several courtyards in Xicheng District a couple of years ago.

The majority of courtyards still intact in downtown Beijing were built during the Ming and Qing dynasties and have long been considered the epitome of China's traditional urban residential architecture. Heritage experts say that the design, layout and material of these "siheyuan" reflect the Chinese ancient philosophy of harmony between humans and heaven.

However, countless courtyards have decayed greatly under the stress of Beijing's population growth. About 10,000 families are living in structures worthy of cultural-heritage protection.

"We will repair the old courtyards section by section, rather than demolishing the old and restoring newer ones," Kong said. "Moving most residents out of siheyuan is crucial to the preservation. But it requires time and money. We will push forward the repair work step by step."

Cultural relic excavations in eight Olympic venue sites so far have found more than 450 ancient tombs and 1,000-plus antiques dating back from the Western Han Dynasty (206 BC-25 AD) to the Qing Dynasty, according to the Beijing Academy of Cultural Heritage Studies.

The Beijing Municipal Administration of Cultural Heritage and the Beijing Construction Command of the Olympic Venues have jointly issued a notice stipulating that archaeological investigation and excavation must be carried out first at the sites where gymnasiums and stadiums are to be built.

The tombs cleared for the Olympic venues include wood confines, brick chambers, pits and urns, most of which were single-coffin tombs. More than 1,000 articles of porcelain, pottery, gold and silver ware, jade, bronze ware and ironware have also been unearthed.

Archaeologists say that these cultural relics provide new materials for research into burial and funeral customs in the Han, Liao, Jin, Ming and Qing dynasties in Beijing and are of great value for the exploration of Beijing's regional culture and its history of urban development.

(China Daily October 13, 2006)