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 Early history
 Zhoukoudian,
the earliest remnants of human habitation in the Beijing municipality are found in the caves of Dragon Bone Hill near the village of Zhoukoudian in Fangshan District, where the
Beijing (Peking) Man had lived. Homo erectus fossils from the caves date to 230,000 to 250,000 years ago. Paleolithic homo sapiens also lived there about 27,000 years ago. There were cities in the vicinities of Beijing by the 1st millennium BC, and the capital of the State of Yan, one of the powers of the Warring States Period (473-221 BC), Ji,
was established in present-day Beijing.
After the fall of the Yan, the subsequent Qin, Han, and Jin dynasties set up
local prefectures in the area. In Tang Dynasty it became the headquarters for Fanyang jiedushi, the virtual military governor of current northern Hebei area. An Lushan launched An Shi Rebellion from here in 755 AD.
Medieval period
The Pagoda of Tianning Temple, at 13 stories and 57.8 meter in height, built in 1120 during the Liao
Dynasty. In 936, the Later Jin Dynasty (936-947) of northern China ceded a large part of its northern frontier, including modern Beijing, to the Khitan Liao Dynasty. In 938, the Liao Dynasty set up a secondary capital in what is now Beijing, and called it Nanjing, the "Southern Capital". In 1125, the
Jurchens Jin Dynasty conquered Liao, and in 1153 moved its capital to Liao's Nanjing, calling it Zhongdu,
meaning "the central capital." Zhongdu was situated in what is now the area centered around Tianning
Temple, slightly to the southwest of central Beijing. Some of the oldest existing relics in Beijing, including the Niujie Mosque and the Tianning Temple, date to the Liao era.
Mongol forces burned Zhongdu to the ground in 1215. Later in 1264, in preparation for the conquest of all of China to establish the Yuan Dynasty, Kublai Khan decided to rebuild it slightly north to the center of the Jin capital, and in 1272, he made this city his capital as Dadu,
meaning "great capital", otherwise spelled as Cambaluc or Cambuluc in Marco Polo's accounts. Construction of Dadu
finished in 1293. The decision of Kublai Khan greatly enhanced the status of a city that had been situated on the northern fringe of China proper. The center of Dadu was situated slightly north of modern central Beijing. It centered on what is now the northern stretch of the 2nd Ring Road, and stretched northwards to between the 3rd and 4th Ring Roads. There are remnants of the Yuan-era wall still standing, and they are known as the Tucheng,
the 'earth wall'.
 Ming and Qing period
In 1368, Zhu Yuanzhang, the founder of the Ming Dynasty and future Hongwu Emperor, made his imperial ambitions known by sending an army toward the Yuan capital. The last Yuan emperor fled north to Shangdu and Zhu declared the founding of the Ming Dynasty after razing the Yuan palaces in Dadu to the ground. The city was renamed to Beiping,
or "northern peace" in translation in the same year and Shuntian prefecture was established in the area around the city. In 1403, the third Ming emperor, Yongle Emperor, renamed this city to Beijing , or "northern capital"
in translation, and designated Beijing to be the co-capital alongside then current capital of Nanjing. Beijing
became the subject of a major construction project for a new Imperial residence, the Forbidden City.
The construction took nearly 15 years. When the palace was finished, the Yongle Emperor ceremoniously took up residence. From 1421 onwards, Beijing, also known as Jingshi, was the "official" capital of the Ming Dynasty while Nanjing was demoted to the status of
the secondary capital. The system of dual capitals continued for the duration of the Ming Dynasty. Thirteen of the sixteen Ming Emperors are buried in elaborate tombs near Beijing.
By the 15th century, Beijing had essentially taken its current shape, and the
Ming-era city wall served as the Beijing city wall until modern times, when it
was pulled down and the 2nd Ring Road was built in its place. many believe that Beijing was the largest city in the world from 1425 to 1650 and from 1710 to 1825. Other notable buildings constructed during the Ming period include the Temple of Heaven.
The Tiananmen Gate, now a state symbol of China and featured on its emblem, was first built in 1420, and rebuilt several times later. Tiananmen Square was built in 1651 and enlarged in 1958. Jesuits finished building the first Beijing area Roman Catholic church in 1652 at the Xuanwu Gate, where Italian Jesuit Matteo Ricci lived; the modern Nantang,
or Southern Cathedral has been built over the original cathedral. The end of the Ming came in 1644 when Li Zicheng's peasant army captured Beijing and overthrew the Ming government. When
 the powerful Manchu army arrived at the outskirts of the city, Li and his followers abandoned the city and as a result the Manchu forces, under Prince Dorgon, captured Beijing without a fight.
Prince Dorgon established the Qing Dynasty as a direct successor to the Ming, and Beijing remained China's capital. The Qing Emperors made some modifications to the Imperial residence, but in large part, the Ming buildings and the general layout remained unchanged. Beijing at this time was also known as Jingshi, which corresponded to the Manchu Gemun Hecen
with the same meaning. The classic Chinese novel Dream of the Red Chamber is set in Beijing during the early Qing.
At the end of Qing period, Beijing was the scene of the siege of the foreign legations during the Boxer Rebellion in 1900.Some important Imperial structures in the city were destroyed during the fighting, including the Hanlin Academy and the Summer Palace.
Republican era
The Xinhai Revolution of 1911, aimed at replacing Qing rule with a republic, originally intended to establish its capital at
 Nanjing. After high ranking Qing official Yuan Shikai forced the abdication of the Qing emperor in Beijing and ensured the success of the revolution, the revolutionaries in Nanjing accepted that Yuan should be the president of the new Republic of China, and that the capital should remain at Beijing. Yuan gradually consolidated power and became by 1915 the new emperor but died less than a year into his reign.
China then fell under the control of regional warlords, and the most powerful
factions fought frequent wars to take control of the capital at Beijing.
Following the success of the Kuomintang's Northern Expedition, which pacified
the warlords of the north, Nanjing was officially made the capital of the
Republic of China in 1928, and Beijing was renamed Beiping on June 28 that year in English meaning "northern peace" or "north pacified". During the Second Sino-Japanese War, Beiping fell to Japan on July
29, 1937, and was made the seat of the Provisional Government of the Republic of China, a puppet state that ruled the ethnic Chinese portions of Japanese-occupied northern China;
later, government was merged into the larger Wang Jingwei Government
based in Nanjing.
People's Republic
Mao Zedong proclaiming the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949. On January
30, 1949, during the Chinese Civil War, Communist entered Beiping without a fight. On October
1 of the same year, the Communist Party of China, under the leadership of Mao Zedong, announced in Tiananmen the creation of the People's Republic of China and renamed the city back to Beijing. Just a few days earlier, the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference had decided that Beijing would be the capital of the new government.
 At the time of the founding of the People's Republic, Beijing Municipality consisted of just its urban area and immediate suburbs. The urban area was divided into many small districts inside what is now the
Second Ring Road. The Beijing city wall was torn down to make way for the construction of the
Second Ring Road, which was finished by 1981 in accord with the 1982 city plan.
That road was the first of a series of new ring roads intended for automobiles
rather than for bicycles, the traditional popular transportation vehicles for
many decades.
Following the economic reforms led by Deng Xiaoping, the urban area of Beijing has expanded greatly. Formerly within the confines of the
Second Ring Road and the Third Ring Road, the urban area of Beijing is now pushing at the limits of the recently constructed
Fifth Ring Road and Sixth Ring Road, with many areas that were formerly farmland now developed residential or commercial districts. According to a 2005 newspaper report, the size of the newly developed Beijing land was one and a half times larger than the land of old Beijing within the
Second Ring Road. Wangfujing and Xidan have developed into flourishing shopping districts, while Zhongguancun has become a major centre of electronics
and information technology in China. In recent years, the expansion of Beijing has also brought to the forefront some problems of urbanization, such as heavy traffic, poor air quality, the loss of historic
neighborhoods, and significant influx of migrants from less developed regions of
the country, especially rural areas.
On 13 July 2001, the International Olympic Committee historically selected Beijing as the host for the 2008 Summer Olympics,
which was successfully held in the summer of 2008.
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