Chairman Mao Memorial Hall

Mao's Mausoleum 毛主席纪念堂

Houses the embalmed body of Chairman Mao
Built 1976-1977
Not always open when the corpse of the Great Helmsman requires attention
Free admission
Reverent, quasi-religious experience
Located on the south side of Tiananmen Square

Chairman Mao Zedong (Mao Tse-tung), the founder of Communist China was born in rural Hunan province in 1893 and died in Beijing in 1976 of Motor Neurone Disease. Mao himself had wished for his body to be cremated after his death but his body was embalmed on the orders of the Chinese Communist Party.

The large square building of Mao's Mausoleum is located in the south of Tiananmen Square on the site of what was once the southern gate to the Forbidden City (Gate of China) during the Ming and Qing dynasties, which was demolished in 1954.

Monument to the People's Heroes and Armed Police with the Great Hall of the People in the background. — Monument to the People's Heroes and Armed Police with the Great Hall of the People in the background

Mao's Mausoleum, Beijing, China. — Mao's Mausoleum, Beijing, China

The building was constructed in 6 months following Mao's death with materials symbolically chosen from all over China, supposedly by "volunteers" who actually played little or no part in the work. The body was embalmed using Soviet know-how passed on by the Vietnamese following the Sino-Soviet split in the late 1950s.

Mao's body is encased in a Chinese-produced crystal coffin of incredible purity and strength.

The Chairman Mao Memorial Hall is open for only a few hours each day (less in summer) and visitors are quickly filed through the dimly-lit space. There is a souvenir shop on exit and all bags and cameras must be checked in before entry.