Confucius TempleⅠ

The Temple of Confucius, the present site of the Capital Museum, is located at the eastern end of Guo Zijian (Imperial College), Chengxian Street, East District of Beijing with an area of 22,000 square meters (5.4 acres). It is built in memory of the great philosopher, thinker, educationalist Confucius in ancient times.

The temple in Beijing was initially built in 1302 and renovated during the Ming (1368 - 1644) and Qing (1644 - 1911) Dynasties. It is the second largest temple constructed for Confucius, ranking only behind the one in Qufu, Shandong Province. Comparatively speaking, the Confucius Temple in Qufu is much larger in size, but this one in Beijing is much more socially important than that in Qufu, because the imperial officials of the Yuan (1271 - 1368), Ming and Qing Dynasties all came to Beijing Confucius Temple to pay respect to the ancient sage Confucius, they used to host the memorable ceremonies to honor Confucius in the 2nd and 8th months of the Chinese calendar, thus it is matchless in the Chinese feudal society.