With a total area of 16,800 sq. kilometers, Beijing Municipality is roughly the size of Belgium and has 10.6 million permanent residents. Beijing is a city of very orderly design, although it my not always appear as so. The city can be thought of as one giant grid, with the Forbidden City at its centre. A major boulevard can change names six or eight times along its length.
As China's political and cultural center, Beijing is very influential politically, economically and socially. It is here that the central government, and all ministries, departments and offices of the State Council exert their management power. It is also here that China conducts high-level political, economic, science and technological, and cultural exchanges with other countries of the world. To date, some 160 countries have set up embassies in Beijing . In addition, the city has established the relationship of sister cities with 22 foreign cities.
The earliest record of settlements in Beijing date from around 1000 BC. It developed as a frontier trading town for the Mongols, Koreans and tribes from Shandong and central China. During the Liao Dynasty Beijing was referred to as Yanjing (capital of Yan), and this is still the name used for Beijing 's most popular beer. Beijing 's history really gets under way in 1215 AD, the year that Genghis Khan set fire to Yanjing and slaughtered everything in sight. From the ashes emerged Dadu (Great Capital), alias Khanbaliq, grandson Kublai had made himself ruler of most of Asia, and Khanbaliq was his capital. The mercenary Zhu Yanhang led an uprising in 1368, taking over the city and ushering in the Ming Dynasty. The city was renamed Beiping(northern peace) and for the next 35 years the capital was shifted south to Nanjing.
In the early 1400s Zhu's son Yong Le shuffled the court back to Beiping and renamed it Beijing (Northern Capital). Many of the structures like the Forbidden City and Tiantan were built in Yong Le's reign.
On 1 October of 1949 Mao proclaimed a ' People's Republic' to an audience of some 500,000 citizens in Tiananmen Square. Later, the reform of the 1980s and 1990s have brought foreign investments, new high-rises, freeways and shopping malls. Nowadays, Beijing is increasingly becoming a modern and prosperous city.