Research of construction of city wall in Shanxi in Ming Dynasty from the perspective of city defense

Based on the repair records of the city in Shanxi in Ming Dynasty, the historical information digitization and graphic method is used to analyze the construction of city wall in Shanxi, explore the history behind the rule of information, and illustrate how the defense concept was realized in a large number of local cities in that period. It is shown that the war occurrence and the urgent need for security were the promotions of construction of local city wall. In the process, inheritance, improvement and completeness were the striking features of three phases (early, mid and late) of the construction, respectively. Although the guidance of the city defense was the same, there were different characteristics of diversity and unity in the construction of city wall due to the difference of historical heritage, city needs and construction ability.