North China, or Huabei () is a geographical region of China, consisting of the provinces of Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei,

Shanxi Shanxi (; ; formerly romanised as Shansi) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China and is part of the North China region. The capital and largest city of the province is Taiyuan, while its next most populated prefecture-lev ...

and Inner Mongolia. Part of the larger region of

Northern China Northern China () and Southern China () are two approximate regions within China. The exact boundary between these two regions is not precisely defined and only serve to depict where there appears to be regional differences between the climate ...

(''Beifang''), it lies north of the Qinling–Huaihe Line, with its heartland in the

North China Plain The North China Plain or Huang-Huai-Hai Plain () is a large-scale downfaulted rift basin formed in the late Paleogene and Neogene and then modified by the deposits of the Yellow River. It is the largest alluvial plain of China. The plain is bord ...

. In modern times, the area has shifted in terms of socio-political and economic composition. Nowadays unique, embracing a North Chinese culture, it is influenced by Marxism, Soviet systems of industry while preserving a traditional Chinese indigenous culture. Agriculturally, the region cultivates wheat. Most inhabitants here speak variants of Northern Chinese languages such as

Mandarin Mandarin or The Mandarin may refer to: Language * Mandarin Chinese, branch of Chinese originally spoken in northern parts of the country ** Standard Chinese or Modern Standard Mandarin, the official language of China ** Taiwanese Mandarin, Stand ...

, which includes Beijing dialect and its cousin variants. The Beijing dialect is largely the basis of

Standard Chinese Standard Chinese ()—in linguistics Standard Northern Mandarin or Standard Beijing Mandarin, in common speech simply Mandarin, better qualified as Standard Mandarin, Modern Standard Mandarin or Standard Mandarin Chinese—is a modern Standar ...

(or Standard Mandarin), the official language of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Jin Chinese and Mongolian are also widely spoken due to the political and cultural history of the area.

History

In prehistory, the region was home to the Yangshao and Longshan cultures. Peking man was found near modern-day Beijing. The main agricultural lands of China lay in the area known as the Central Plain, an area located bordered by the Yangtze river to its south and the Yellow River to its north. Further north of the Yellow River lies the

Gobi desert The Gobi Desert (Chinese: 戈壁 (沙漠), Mongolian: Говь (ᠭᠣᠪᠢ)) () is a large desert or brushland region in East Asia, and is the sixth largest desert in the world. Geography The Gobi measures from southwest to northeast an ...

and steppe lands that extend west across Eurasia. This region has long, harsh winters and suffers from water scarcity. Despite these challenges, some forms of agriculture have been successful in this region, especially

animal husbandry Animal husbandry is the branch of agriculture concerned with animals that are raised for meat, fibre, milk, or other products. It includes day-to-day care, selective breeding, and the raising of livestock. Husbandry has a long history, starti ...

, certainly of horse and camel, and possibly other types of animals. The crops '' Panicum miliaceum'' and '' Setaria italica'', both types of

millet Millets () are a highly varied group of small-seeded grasses, widely grown around the world as cereal crops or grains for fodder and human food. Most species generally referred to as millets belong to the tribe Paniceae, but some millets al ...

grain, are believed to be indigenous to northern China. ''Panicum miliaceum'' is known from the Cishan culture in Hebei province, recovered as phytoliths from pits in stratigraphic sections. Sediments from the pits have radiocarbon dates from 8500 to 7500 BCE. Archaeological evidence of charred grains found in early Holocene layers in Hebei province at Nanzhuangtou and Cishan has led scholars to revise the earliest dates associated with millet by about two millennia. Millet sites are concentrated along the boundaries of the

Loess Loess (, ; from german: Löss ) is a clastic, predominantly silt-sized sediment that is formed by the accumulation of wind-blown dust. Ten percent of Earth's land area is covered by loess or similar deposits. Loess is a periglacial or aeolian ...

and Mongolian Plateau, separated by a mountain chain from the

Huabei plain The North China Plain or Huang-Huai-Hai Plain () is a large-scale downfaulted rift basin formed in the late Paleogene and Neogene and then modified by the deposits of the Yellow River. It is the largest alluvial plain of China. The plain is border ...

and the

Dongbei plain The Northeast China Plain (), commonly known as Song liao Plain or the Manchurian Plain or just the Northeast Plain, is located in Northeast China, historically also known as Manchuria. It lies between the Greater and Lesser Khingan and Changba ...

, North China's main

alluvial plains An alluvial plain is a largely flat landform created by the deposition of sediment over a long period of time by one or more rivers coming from highland regions, from which alluvial soil forms. A floodplain is part of the process, being the smal ...

, located to the west. Millet cultivation was similarly situated relative to the Qinling mountains at Dadiwan, and the Yitai mountains at Yuezhuang. Macrofossil evidence (charred grains of foxtail and broomcorn millet) has been recovered from Xinglonggou in Inner Mongolia, Xinle in

Liaoning Liaoning () is a coastal province in Northeast China that is the smallest, southernmost, and most populous province in the region. With its capital at Shenyang, it is located on the northern shore of the Yellow Sea, and is the northernmost ...

, Cishan in Hebei, and

Dadiwan The Dadiwan culture (c. 7900–7200 BP) was a Neolithic culture located primarily in the eastern portion of Gansu and Shaanxi provinces in modern China. The culture takes its name from the deepest cultural layer found during the original excavat ...

Gansu Gansu (, ; alternately romanized as Kansu) is a province in Northwest China. Its capital and largest city is Lanzhou, in the southeast part of the province. The seventh-largest administrative district by area at , Gansu lies between the Tibet ...

, among other sites in Eastern and Central China.

Administrative divisions in the PRC

Cities with urban area over one million in population

: Provincial capitals in bold.

References

{{Authority control Regions of China

History

Administrative divisions in the PRC

Cities with urban area over one million in population

See also

References