2500 years ago Emperor Q'in Shih Huang Ti, the first emperor of the Q'in (pronounced "Chin") Dynasty (255-206 BCE), and the man who gave his name to the country, sent men of the arts, sciences, horticulture, and floriculture to all his provinces with instruction to recreate representative replicas of each canton's landscape in miniature, and bring them back to the palace. He instructed them to portray each canton, complete with people, animals, architectural features, in such a way that seasonal changes would also be an integral part of the landscapes. He wanted to see the rivers and streams, lakes and ponds, and mountains and valleys. He wanted to see the extremes of the season, and feel the tranquillity of perfection.
He knew it would be years before the penjings would be delivered to the Forbidden City, and while he waited he prepared a place for their eventual display. He had a map of China carved into the marble surface of his personal courtyard, and had pedestals placed in the center of each canton (states) for each miniature landscape to rest upon.
When the penjings were delivered, and placed upon their respective pedestal, he took a walking tour of his miniature empire each morning to appreciate and celebrate the natural diversity of his kingdom. When word of his tiny landscapes began to pass among the high officials, scholars, and wealthy merchants, tiny landscapes began appearing in their homes and courtyards. It was only a matter of time before the homes of commoners came to be decorated with similar landscapes.
Aesthetics
According to ancient Chinese and Japanese texts, the harmony displayed in each miniature landscape, in addition to being visually beautiful, is the spiritual expressions of the inter-related connection between man and earth, man and the Omnipresent, and teaches perseverance, humility and patience.
This ancient Chinese art of growing miniature or miniaturized plants in a container (penjing), not necessarily restricted to trees, is similar to bonsai, saikei and bonkei. Penjing prefers the plants to be grown in a more natural form, and maintained indoors, if they can not survive the extremes of temperature outside. They should be maintained out of doors if they can not survive the low light, and semi-constant temperature. The bonsai ideal restricts the art form to growing trees, and imposes guidelines for presentation, growing, style, color and size of the container, and the mental attitudes while creating the 'living wonder.' The Japanese concept of bonsai requires the plants be more stylized
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