The Monument to the People's Heroesis a ten-storyobelisk, erected as a national monument honoring the martyrs of revolutionary struggle during the 19th and 20th centuries.

obelisk /ˈɒbəlɪsk/ ：方尖纪念碑

The obelisk monument was built in accordance with a resolution of the First Plenary Session of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference adopted on Sept 30, 1949.

Designs for the monument were solicited from across China. The construction committee for the monument received more than 140 drafts for the project by 1951.

Based on an idea from the many designs submitted, a design pattern was displayed for review at the Beijing Municipal Political Consultative Conference, as well as at the national commemorations.

The government of the day decided that construction would begin on Army Day (August 1) of 1952,the 25th anniversary of the foundation of the People's Liberation Army (PLA).

On the front of the monument is an inscription in Mao Zedong's handwriting, which reads, "Eternal Glory to the People's Heroes!"

On the back of the monument is anepitaph, composed by Mao Zedong and written by Zhou Enlai.

epitaph /ˈepɪtɑːf/：碑文

At that time, Chairman Mao's 8 characters were written on an envelope, each character being only about 2 inches long, and to engrave these characters on the monument, they had to be magnified more than 20 times.

In view of the technological level at the time, the only way to enlarge these characters is to take pictures of these characters with a camera, wash out the photos, and then enlarge them with a slide projector, and then outline them.

Initially, due to the lack of delineation experts, there were many problems with the appearance, such as the lack of character, lack of charm and so on.

It was not until the appearance of calligraphy and seal engraver, Wei Changqing, that this problem was solved. Wei is highly experienced and conducted a lot of research on Chairman Mao's calligraphy style. Under his personal sketch, the enlarged characters look exactly the same as those written by Chairman Mao.

On the pedestal of the obelisk are huge bas-reliefs depicting eight major revolutionary episodes: the destruction of opium at Humen in 1839, the Jintian Uprising in 1851, the Wuchang Uprising in 1911, the Nanchang Uprising in 1927, the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931-45) and the Yangtze River Crossing Campaign in 1949.

After the theme of the relief were determined, the expert group discussed the subject of the reliefs. Parameters included not depicting specific heroes, not gratuitous depictions of violence and other limiters gave way to the scenes of bravery we see today.