Chinese Ancient Architecture Culture Altar and Temple Architecture

     Sacrificial activities have existed since ancient times. Ancestors worshipped nature and ghosts, gods, and ancestors. By worshipping their ancestors, gods, mountains, rivers, sun, and moon, they expressed their intention to gain spiritual strength to resist the outside world. With the development of mature ritual systems, specialized worship venues were built, and ritual worship was held. Altars and temples were an indispensable type of architecture in ancient China, from the royal family to the ordinary people, There are dedicated buildings for worship.

     According to the different objects of worship, sacrificial buildings can be roughly divided into two categories: one is the worship of all natural things, such as heaven and earth, sun and moon, ancient farmers, crops, wind, rain and lightning, etc.. The second is the humanistic worship of ancestors and specific figures, known as humanistic deities.

     Natural deities such as the Temple of Heaven are the largest surviving ancient sacrificial architectural complex in China, serving as a place for emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties to worship the heavens.

      Humanistic deities such as Beijing Confucian Temple and Suzhou Confucian Temple.