星星掉到地上来？

又是一则景点趣事。在北京的天坛，有个小景点叫“七星石”，藏在茂密的树林里。有人说他们七个是天上掉下来的七颗星星，也有老百姓戏称他们为“七仙女”。那他们到底是哪儿来的石头呢？

The Seven-Star Stone is located on the southeastern side of the seventy-two section connected a long corridor in the Temple of Heaven. The legend goes like that: one night the heavenly gate was open then the seven big dippers fell down to earth that made a suggestion to the emperor the place where the heaven-worshipping altar should be constructed when the emperor did want to build a heaven-worshipping altar there. Another story told us that these stones were originally meteorites¹ but were moved here as a sign of auspiciousness² to the Ming Dynasty. But actually these seven stones were placed here after they were carved in 1530. At that time a Taoist priest said that the eastern part of the Temple of Heaven was too spacious³ and open and that was no good to the emperor’s throne and the Ming Dynasty. Emperor Jiajing believed what the Taoist said and seven stones were set up on the eastern part to overcome the undesirable⁴ geomancy. After the Manchu established the Qing Dynasty, a small stone was set up in the northeast corner of Seven Star Stone to commemorate⁵ the merits and virtue⁶ of their Qing emperor’s ancestors. The eighth stone symbolized⁷ Changbai Mountain. The reason for the Qing rulers put the stone in the northeast direction was just to show that they would not forget their origin, for their ancestors of the Qing emperors came from northeast China and had risen to power and position in northeast China.