Tiananmen square

Tiananmen Square occupies a central location in both the physical and the symbolic geographies of China's capital city, Beijing. The site takes its name from the Gate of Heavenly Peace (Tiananmen), which is situated at the northern end of the square. Further to the north of the Gate of Heavenly Peace sits the Meridian Gate (Wumen), the entrance to the Forbidden City. Although Tiananmen predates Tiananmen Square by some several hundred years, both sites have played and continue to play prominent roles in the political history of China.

The Gate of Heavenly Peace was originally built in 1420, during the Ming Dynasty. At this time, the gate was given the name Chengtianmen to suggest that the dynasty had received the Mandate of Heaven to rule. This ancient Chinese notion, central to both the political and the religious history of the country, held that a virtuous ruler both rose to and remained in power by heavenly decree and sanction. The gate was thus from its earliest inception designed to represent the legitimacy of Ming rule, and the site has ever since been used to the same effect by political dynasties. During the reign of the Qing Dynasty Emperor Shunzi (1644–1662), the gate was given the name Tiananmen, and Mao Zedong officially proclaimed the establishment of the People's Republic of China from the site on October 1, 1949.

It was the Communist Party that erected Tiananmen Square in the 1950s, and the site was often used to hold mass political rallies. Today, the site also contains both the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong and the Monument to the People's Heroes. To the east of the square lies the National Museum of China, and to the west sits the Great Hall of the People. Closing off the square to the south is the Central Yang Gate (Zhengyangmen), which is popularly known as Front Gate (Qianmen).

Of all the historical events that have occurred at the site, the most notorious remains what is referred to in China as the June Fourth Incident. In April 1989, spurred by the desire for more democratic reforms in the government of China, university and college students in Beijing held a series of escalating protest marches and rallies in Tiananmen Square. By May, growing numbers of urban workers in Beijing had joined the protesting students. On May 13, students and other protesters occupied Tiananmen Square and began a hunger strike, and on May 20, the government declared martial law, determined to end the protests before any deaths resulted. The Chinese military entered the square in force on the night of June 3, and by the next morning, the area had been cleared of protesters. The amount of violence involved in putting down the protests, as well as the numbers of dead and injured that resulted, remains a subject of debate.