Before the Qing took Beijing, they built their court at Mukden, today Shenyang. The palace that survives there is the first seat of the dynasty and an inscribed component of the imperial palaces of the Ming and Qing dynasties on the UNESCO World Heritage List. Its interest lies in what it is not: not a copy of Chinese imperial planning, but a hybrid, where the axial courtyards of Han tradition meet forms and details drawn from Manchu and Mongol practice, including an octagonal ceremonial hall set before pavilions arranged for the banner princes. Glazed tile, painted beams, thrones and screens survive in numbers. This episode uses the palace to tell the story of a frontier power in the moment before it became an empire: how a ruling house stages authority, houses a court, and borrows an architectural language while insisting on its own.
