Zhaoyuan () is a

county-level city A county-level city () is a County-level divisions of China, county-level administrative division of the China, People's Republic of China. County-level cities have judiciary, judicial but no legislature, legislative rights over their own local or ...

within the

prefecture-level city A prefecture-level city () or prefectural city is an administrative division of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC), ranking below a province of China, province and above a Counties of the People's Republic of China, county in China's ...

Yantai Yantai, formerly known as Chefoo, is a coastal prefecture-level city on the Shandong Peninsula in northeastern Shandong province of the People's Republic of China. Lying on the southern coast of the Bohai Strait, Yantai borders Qingdao ...

Shandong Province Shandong is a coastal province in East China. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history since the beginning of Chinese civilization along the lower reaches of the Yellow River. It has served as a pivotal cultural and religious center ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

, located on the

Bohai Sea The Bohai Sea ( zh, c=渤海, p=Bó Hǎi, l=Bo Sea) is a gulf/inland sea approximately in area on the east coast of Mainland China. It is the northwestern and innermost extension of the Yellow Sea, to which it connects via the Bohai Strait. It ...

. Zhaoyuan is well known for its abundant gold deposit and production, and is occasionally nicknamed "China's gold capital" (). The city spans an area of , and has a population of 560,234 as of 2019.

History

The area was first incorporated under the

Han dynasty The Han dynasty was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China (202 BC9 AD, 25–220 AD) established by Liu Bang and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–206 BC ...

as Qucheng County (). Gold was discovered at Zhaoyuan in the

Tang dynasty The Tang dynasty (, ; zh, c=唐朝), or the Tang Empire, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 618 to 907, with an Wu Zhou, interregnum between 690 and 705. It was preceded by the Sui dynasty and followed ...

. The myth accompanying the city's discovery of gold is that a giant tortoise named Ao once told villagers struggling with famine to dig, and upon digging, they struck gold. The county was named Zhaoyuan County () in 1131.

People's Republic of China

Five townships in Zhaoyuan were upgraded to

towns A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

on September 1, 1988. On December 21, 1991, Zhaoyuan was upgraded from a

county A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

to a

. Throughout the mid-1990s, three more townships were upgraded to towns. On January 11, 1999, the town of Zhaocheng () was divided into three subdistricts: , Quanshan Subdistrict, and . The Fifth National Population Census of the People's Republic of China reported that Zhaoyuan had a population of 593,705. On December 19, 2000, Dahuchenjia Township () became the city's last township to be upgraded to a town.

2014 murder of Wu Shuoyan

In late May 2014, five members of The Church of Almighty God, an outlawed new-age cult, entered a

McDonald's McDonald's Corporation, doing business as McDonald's, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational fast food chain store, chain. As of 2024, it is the second largest by number of locations in the world, behind only the Chinese ch ...

in Zhaoyuan and began soliciting customers' phone numbers. When 37 year-old Wu Shuoyan refused to give her phone number to the group, they claimed she was an "evil spirit", and began beating her with chairs and a metal mop handle, ultimately killing her. In February 2015, two of the attackers were executed, and the other three received jail sentences ranging from seven years to life.

Geography

Zhaoyuan's city center is located approximately southwest of Yantai's urban center. The city's terrain is higher in the northeast, middle and west, and lower in the northwest and southeast

Climate

The city's annual average temperature is , and its annual average precipitation is .

Administrative divisions

Zhaoyuan administers five subdistricts and nine

Subdistricts

Zhaoyuan's five subdistricts are , Quanshan Subdistrict, , , and .

Towns

Zhaoyuan's nine towns are , , , , , , , , and .

Economy

The city has a significant amount of

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

deposits, largely concentrated in its northeast. Zhaojin Mining has its headquarters located in the city. Additionally, Linglong Tire is headquartered in the city.

Transport

National Highway 206 runs through Zhaoyuan.

Tourist attractions

A large golden statue of Ao'','' a Chinese mythical giant turtle is located in the

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

of Oujiakuang (), in the town of . Located in Luoshan National Forest Park (), the statue is Asia's largest statue of Ao'','' and is located at . The statue is 15 meters tall and 20 meters long.招远罗山《金鳌》
/ref> The is located in Zhaoyuan.

Notable people

* Chi Haotian, PLA General,

Minister of National Defense of the People's Republic of China The minister of national defense of the People's Republic of China is the head of the Ministry of National Defense (China), Ministry of National Defense and one of the top positions in the State Council of the People's Republic of China, State C ...

* Sun Baoguo, BTBU Professor, Academician of

Chinese Academy of Engineering The Chinese Academy of Engineering (CAE, ) is the national academy of the People's Republic of China for engineering. It was established in 1994 and is an institution of the State Council of China. The CAE and the Chinese Academy of Sciences a ...

References

{{Yantai Cities in Shandong Yantai