Tuesday’s presidential address had folks flocking to Google in droves for information about a border wall, but not the wall at the American-Mexican border. They wanted to know if the Great Wall of China worked.
Interest in the ancient wall spiked as Trump sold his wall-building agenda, Ink Stone News reports.
Last month, citizens interested in the Great Wall of China went through the roof when Joe Won, a Chinese-American comedian told the audience at The Last Show With Stephen Colbert: “I’m from China, so I know a lot about walls,” he joked. “They don’t work.”
The funny guy went on to say a Trump border wall would just create a “huge tourist attraction.”
Many people don’t realize that the Great Wall wasn’t built overnight. It actually took over 2000 years to construct over many dynasties and rulers. Qin Shi Huang, the founder of the Qin dynasty and first emperor of China has often been credited with the wall’s construction. However, he merely connected several walls that were constructed by each state in the country.
“Every state built its own wall,” Li Hsiao-ti, a historian with the City University of Hong Kong, told Ink Stone. “These walls were constructed to fend off northern races such as the nomadic Xiongnu people. What Qin Shi Huang did was only to connect these walls.”
Sure, the wall made it more difficult for enemies to invade, but efforts to create more diplomatic strategies to keep the Hans and northern races happily coexisting. Some of those strategies included trade and intermarriage been Mongols and Han Chinese.
It should also be noted that the Great Wall of China didn’t stop Manchus from overthrowing the Ming Dynasty.
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