Attractions
Nanjing History
Regarded as one of the Four Great Ancient Capital Cities of China, Nanjing is the capital of Jiangsu Province today. Dating back to about 6,000 years ago, Nanjing had been the capital city of ten dynasties in China, hence, based on material records, it has over forty names, such as Jinling, Moling, Jianye, Jiankang and Jiangning etc. It can be said that Nanjing played a very important role in Chinese history.
Early Times
It is said that in 495BC King of the State of Wu built a fort named Yecheng which was within today’s Nanjing city. Then, in 473 BC, Wu was conquered by the State of Yue and later Yuecheng was built at the southwestern corner of today’s Zhonghua Gate. Then, it comes to 333 BC, the State of Yue was defeated by the State of Chu and another new name came into being-Jinling Yi which was constructed in western Nanjing of today. In addition, Nanjing was also chosen by following Qin and Han Dynasties with a name Moling.
In 229 BC, Nanjing became a capital firstly. During the Three Kingdoms Period (220-280AD), King of the Wu Sun Quan extended his capital based on Jinling Yi and renamed as Jianye. Later in 280 AD, Nanjing was under the control of West Jin and well developed. Although soon collapsed, remnants of the West Jin rebuilt its court in Nanjing and named it Jiankang. Later, Nanjing served as the capitals of the Southern Dynasties (420-589) for a long time till the Sui Dynasty reunified China.
Nanjing was totally destroyed during Sui Dynasty and rebuilt during late Tang Dynasty. Later during the Southern Tang Dynasty (937-976), Nanjing became a capital once again and was called Jinling.
Ming and Qing Period
In 1368, Zhu Yuanzhang, the first Emperor of Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), reconstructed Nanjing and chose it as Ming’s capital. Present City Wall of Nanjing was just built under his order which was the longest city wall all over the world at that time. Nanjing had been capitals of Ming until Emperor Zhu Di (the third Emperor of Ming Dynasty) changed its capital to Beijing in 1421, but what can be believed is from 1358 to 1425 Nanjing was the largest city worldwide.
During Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), Nanjing was named as Jiangning and visited many times by two well-known Emperors of Qing - Emperor Kangxi and Emperor Qianlong. In the middle age of 19th Century, Nanjing changed to another name -Tianjing.
Modern Times and Now
On January 1912, the Republic of China was founded. Dr. Sun Yat-sen. was the first president and Nanjing was chose as its capital, but soon replaced by Beijing because of some background reasons of that time. In 1927, Kuomingtang, with Chiang Kai-shek as its leader, chose Nanjing as the capital again. In October 1949, the People’s Republic of China was established, and originally Nanjing was a provincial municipality, but soon became the capital city of Jiangsu Province and still is today.
>>Recommended Nanjing Tour;
8 Days 5 Cities of East China & Water Town of Zhouzhuang
