Costs and Benefits of the Great Wall of China...

There are many dead bodies that lie beneath the The Great Wall of China. This wall changed the way China lived for a long time. It is 5,488 miles long and took an outstanding 2,000 years to build. The wall was used as a burial ground for workers of the wall and a source of protection from invaders. Regarding those benefits, there are more costs; The Great Wall of China took extremely long to build, people died working on it, and at some point in history, it separated families.

To start off, the wall took extremely long to build. In the first page of the DBQ, its states, “It was built over a 2,000-year period, and GPS satellites have measured its various sections to be 5,488 long.” This is proof that The Wall took a very long time to finish building. 2,000 years is an extremely long time to create a monument. This wall was built by many different dynasties, considering the fact that many dynasties such as the Qin and Han reached their peaks before the wall was finished being built.

Next off, The Great Wall caused many people to die to working on it. In document E it says, “According to poetry and legends, tens of thousands of soldiers died from hunger, sickness, and extreme hot or cold.” This shows that building the wall was so intense, people even died building it. Building a wall across a whole country is pretty hard, but this wall was crazy enough to kill many people working on it. The soldiers passed away working on the wall were buried inside of the wall.

Lastly, another way The Great Wall of China overweight with costs is because at some points it separated families and soldiers. The soldiers left their families to go work on the wall. Some never returned. In document E it states, “Soldiers forced to leave families and villages for several years.” The government of China forced soldiers to move away from their families to build The Great Wall. This could of really impacted families back when the wall was being built.

To summarize, the costs of The Great Wall of China overweigh the benefits. The wall was a very time consuming thing to work on, considering what it actually did for a while before it was upgraded, it killed many workers and soldiers during the building process, and it separated many soldiers from their beloved family to go work on a wall. Compared to today, The Great Wall China doesn’t have a huge affect on China. Today, there are no invaders that try to invade China, so there is no point of having the wall except for honor of those who worked on it, but it is still a tomb for soldiers.