Bridge of wood, stone, brick, bamboo, rattan, iron, salt and ice

Wooden bridge is the earliest form of bridge. Almost all bridges before Qin and Han Dynasties in China were wooden bridges. Such as the earliest wooden bridge and wooden column beam bridge. Boat bridges appeared around Shang and Zhou Dynasties, and row-column wooden beam bridges and outboard wooden beam bridges appeared around Warring States Period. However, due to the characteristics of wood itself, such as looseness, perishable, and dominated by the strength and length of materials, it is not only difficult to build bridges on rivers with wide rivers, but also difficult to build durable bridges. So in the Northern and Southern Dynasties, it was replaced by a bridge with mixed wood and stone.

Stone and brick bridges. Generally speaking, the bridge deck structure is also a bridge made of stone or brick, but bridges made of pure brick are rare, usually made of brick, wood or masonry, and stone bridges are more common. During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, a wooden bridge with stone piers appeared, and the Western Han Dynasty further developed into a Liang Shi bridge with stone pillars, and a single-span stone arch bridge appeared in the Eastern Han Dynasty. In the Sui Dynasty, the world's first single-hole arc stone arch bridge with shoulder was born, while in the Tang Dynasty, Li Zhaode created a porous Liang Shi bridge. The Song Dynasty witnessed the vigorous development of large stone bridges, creating Liang Shi Bridge which spans several miles at the intersection of rivers and seas, such as Luoyang Bridge and Ping 'an Bridge in Quanzhou, and large stone arch bridges, such as Lugou Bridge in Beijing and baodai bridge in Suzhou.

Bamboo bridge and rattan bridge. Mainly distributed in the south, especially in the southwest. Generally, it is only used on rivers with narrow river surface, or as a temporary crossing. In the early days, it was mainly a cable bridge. In the Northern and Southern Dynasties, the bamboo cable-stayed bridge was called "Ruxiang Bridge". Later, bamboo cable bridge, bamboo pontoon bridge and bamboo slab bridge appeared. In ancient times, iron bridges included iron cable bridges and iron column bridges. The former belongs to the category of cable bridge, which is relatively common and appeared in the Tang Dynasty. The latter is a kind of beam bridge, which is actually a wood-iron mixed bridge, which is relatively rare. Jiangxi has seen an example.

Salt bridge and ice bridge. Mainly exists in special natural environment. The former is mainly found in salt lake area of Qinghai, while the latter is mainly found in cold areas in the north.

According to the structure and appearance

Beam bridge, pontoon bridge, cable bridge and arch bridge are four basic types.

Beam bridge, also known as flat bridge and span bridge, is a bridge supported by piers at a horizontal distance, and then beams are erected to tile the deck. This is the most widely used bridge, which appeared earlier than other bridges in history. It takes the form of wood, stone or a mixture of wood and stone. In the pre-Qin period, all beam bridges used wooden columns as piers, but this kind of wooden column beam structure showed its weakness very early and could not adapt to the development of the situation. Therefore, it was replaced by the Shizhu wooden beam bridge, such as the multi-span long bridge built in Qin and Han Dynasties: Wei Qiao, Baqiao, etc. About the Han Dynasty, the pile foundation technology was invented, and stone piers appeared, which showed that bridges made of wood and stones could cross wider rivers and bear the impact of rough waves. However, because the wooden beam on the stone pier is not resistant to wind and rain erosion, a bridge house was built on the bridge to protect the bridge body. This type of bridge (covered bridge) is more common in the south, but it was first seen in the Yellow River basin. Small and medium-sized Liang Shi or stone slab bridge is the most popular bridge type for its convenient structure, durable materials and labor-saving maintenance. Especially after the Southern Song Dynasty, it was very popular in Quanzhou, Fujian, and many Liang Shi bridges were created. If there is no pier in the middle of a beam bridge, it is called a single-span beam bridge; If there are piers in the water, so that the bridge body forms two holes, it is called a double-span beam bridge; If there are more than two piers, it is called a multi-span beam bridge.

The pontoon bridge is also called pontoon bridge, pontoon boat and pontoon truss. Because it is easy to erect, it is often used in military affairs, so it is also called "Zhanqiao"-a bridge where hundreds of wooden boats (including rafts or bamboo rafts on the water) are placed side by side on the water with chains, and the boats are paved with boards for people to pass. If the bridge in the strict sense is marked by crossing the air and having column piers, it is not a bridge in the full sense. The pontoon bridge is mainly built where the river is too wide, too deep or fluctuating, which is beyond the reach of ordinary wooden columns and bridges. Wooden stakes, iron oxen, iron mountains, Shi Zhuan and stone lions are set on both sides of the pontoon bridge, and ropes are used. Tianjin Bridge, built on the Luoshui River in the first year of the Sui Dynasty, was the first pontoon bridge to connect ships with chains. At present, pontoon bridges are still widely used in southern China, such as Jiangxi, Zhejiang and Guangxi.

Advantages of the pontoon bridge: First, the construction is fast. In the second year of Xianfeng in the Qing Dynasty (AD 1852), the Taiping Army besieged Wuchang and built two pontoons across the Yangtze River overnight. Second, the cost is low. In the Ming Dynasty, Zou Shouyi made a comparison between the stone bridge and the pontoon bridge in Xiufenglin: "If you use the Liang Shi Bridge, it costs 1,000 yuan, and if you use the pontoon bridge, it costs 500 gold, depending on your needs." Third, it can be opened and closed at will, and it is very convenient to disassemble and assemble. Disadvantages are small deadweight, fluctuating with the waves, weak flood resistance, complicated management, frequent maintenance and replacement of ships, bridge decks and mooring cables, and high maintenance costs. Therefore, the ultimate destination of many pontoons is to develop into wooden bridges, Liang Shi bridges or stone arch bridges.

Cable bridge is also called suspension bridge, cable bridge and suspension bridge. , is a bridge suspended with bamboo cables or rattan cables and iron cables as the backbone. Most of them are built on steep river banks and dangerous valleys, and the current is too fast to be used as docks, mainly in the southwest of China. Its practice is to build houses on both sides of the river, set up posts for tying ropes and rotating posts for twisting ropes respectively, then tie several thick ropes flat, and then put boards horizontally on the ropes, and some even add one or two ropes on both sides as handrails. It was first seen in Qin and Han Dynasties. For example, Qin built a bamboo cable bridge in the southwest of Yizhou (now Chengdu) in Sichuan, also called Yili Bridge. The existing famous ones are Luding Iron Cable Bridge and guanxian Bamboo Cable Bridge built in Ming and Qing Dynasties. Crossing the cable bridge feels very thrilling, just as the ancients described the cable bridge: "People are hanging in the air, and if they don't quit in an instant, they will fall into a bottomless valley." Monk Zhimeng in the Tang Dynasty said, "If you can't see the end, the shadows are fighting." In fact, it is still safe to really cross the past, just like Xu Xiake's Travels commented on the Panjiang Bridge in Guizhou: "Look at it and you will stop."

Arch bridge appeared late in the history of Chinese bridges, but once the arch bridge structure was adopted, it developed rapidly and became the most vital bridge type in ancient bridges. Even today, it still has broad prospects for further development. Arch bridges are divided into stone arch bridges, brick arch bridges and wooden arch bridges, among which brick arch bridges are rare and only occasionally used in temples or gardens. Stone arch bridges are commonly used and can be divided into single arch, double arch and multi-arch. The number of arches depends on the width of the river. Generally, the arch in the middle is particularly high, and the arches on both sides are slightly smaller. According to the shape of the arch, there are pentagons, semicircles, pointed arches and flat arches. The bridge deck is generally paved with stone slabs, and the side of the bridge is paved with stone railings. The image of the arch bridge was first seen in the portrait bricks in the Eastern Han Dynasty. It was produced by the shape of the wooden and Liang Shi bridge with outriggers, and was influenced by the shape of the tomb arch and water pipes. Documentary records can be found in Zhu in the Southern and Northern Dynasties. The earliest existing physical object is the Zhao Zhouqiao designed and built by Li Chun in Sui Dynasty. After the Ming dynasty, especially in the Qing dynasty, stone arch bridges issued whole coupons, that is, "bucket coupons."