A series of exhibitions featuring court dresses, palace archives, and jade and gold articles of the Qing Dynasty is currently on show at the Palace Museum, the Beijing Times reports.

A tourist checks out court dresses from the Qing Dynasty on Tuesday, August 19, 2008. [Photo: Beijing Times]

Among these precious articles, a batch of 103 court dresses made their first public appearance. These genuine, rarely-seen dresses are evidence of what the emperors wore on different occasions, including offering rituals to Heaven, Earth, the sun, and the moon.

A staff member at the Palace Museum says the court dresses haven't previously been shown in large quantities due to security concerns and exhibition limitations.

The silk dresses are easily damaged if exposed to high temperatures, humidity, ultraviolet radiation, strong light, and even dust.

The exhibitions, which include nearly one thousand articles in total, are open for free to tourists until early November.

(Xinhua News Agency August 21, 2008)