Dingzhou, or Tingchow in

Postal Map Romanization Postal romanization was a system of transliterating Chinese place names developed by postal authorities in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. For many cities, the corresponding postal romanization was the most common English-language form ...

, and formerly called Ding County or Dingxian, is a

county-level city A county-level municipality (), county-level city or county city, formerly known as prefecture-controlled city (1949–1970: ; 1970–1983: ), is a county-level administrative division of the People's Republic of China. County-level ...

in the

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

Baoding Baoding (), formerly known as Baozhou and Qingyuan, is a prefecture-level city in central Hebei province, approximately southwest of Beijing. As of the 2010 census, Baoding City had 11,194,382 inhabitants out of which 2,176,857 lived in the b ...

Hebei Province Hebei or , (; alternately Hopeh) is a northern province of China. Hebei is China's sixth most populous province, with over 75 million people. Shijiazhuang is the capital city. The province is 96% Han Chinese, 3% Manchu, 0.8% Hui, and 0 ...

. As of 2009, Dingzhou had a population of 1.2 million. Dingzhou has 3

subdistricts A subdistrict or sub-district is an administrative division that is generally smaller than a district. Equivalents * Administrative posts of East Timor, formerly Portuguese-language * Kelurahan, in Indonesia * Mukim, a township in Brunei, Indon ...

, 13 towns, 8 townships, and 1 ethnic township.定州市-行政区网
/ref> Dingzhou is about halfway between Baoding and Shijiazhuang, southwest of

Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...

, and northeast of Shijiazhuang.

History

Dingzhou was originally known as Lunu in early imperial China. A tomb about southwest of Dingzhou from 55BCE was discovered and excavated in 1973. It contained several fragments of Han literature, including

manuscript A manuscript (abbreviated MS for singular and MSS for plural) was, traditionally, any document written by hand – or, once practical typewriters became available, typewritten – as opposed to mechanically printed or reproduced in ...

s of

Confucius Confucius ( ; zh, s=, p=Kǒng Fūzǐ, "Master Kǒng"; or commonly zh, s=, p=Kǒngzǐ, labels=no; – ) was a Chinese philosopher and politician of the Spring and Autumn period who is traditionally considered the paragon of Chinese sages. C ...

's '' Analects'', the

Taoist Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmony with the '' Tao ...

Wenzi The ''Wenzi'' () is a Taoist classic allegedly written by a disciple of Laozi. The text was widely read and highly revered in the centuries following its creation, and even canonized as ''Tongxuan zhenjing'' () in the year 742 CE. However, soon aft ...

'', and the ''

Six Secret Teachings The ''Six Secret Teachings'' (), is a treatise on civil and military strategy traditionally attributed to Lü Shang (aka Jiang Ziya), a top general of King Wen of Zhou, founder of the Zhou dynasty, at around the eleventh century BC. Modern histo ...

'', a military treatise. The identity of the tomb's occupant is unknown, but Chinese archaeologists have speculated that it belonged to

Liu Xiu The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...

or Xu Xing. Dingzhou took its present name around 400CE when it became the seat of Ding Prefecture under the Northern Wei, displacing the earlier

An Prefecture Anzhou or An Prefecture was a '' zhou'' (prefecture) in imperial China, centering on modern Anlu, Hubei, China. It existed (intermittently) from 550 until 1119, when the Song dynasty renamed it De'an Prefecture. Geography The administrative reg ...

.. In the mid-6th century, its territory held 834,211 people living in 177,500 households. Under the Sui, the seat of Boling Commandery at present-day Anping was renamed "Gaoyang". In 607, Dingzhou then became the eponymous seat of a new Boling

commandery In the Middle Ages, a commandery (rarely commandry) was the smallest administrative division of the European landed properties of a military order. It was also the name of the house where the knights of the commandery lived.Anthony Luttrell and G ...

and retained that name and status under the

Tang Tang or TANG most often refers to: * Tang dynasty * Tang (drink mix) Tang or TANG may also refer to: Chinese states and dynasties * Jin (Chinese state) (11th century – 376 BC), a state during the Spring and Autumn period, called Tang (唐) b ...

. until it returned to the name Dingzhou between 621 and 742 and again after 758. Its territory held only 86,869 people in 25,637 households in 639 but recovered to 496,676 people in 78,090 households by 742. In 1055, under the

Song A song is a musical composition intended to be performed by the human voice. This is often done at distinct and fixed pitches (melodies) using patterns of sound and silence. Songs contain various forms, such as those including the repetit ...

, the city became the home of the

Liaodi Pagoda The Liaodi Pagoda () of Kaiyuan Monastery, Dingzhou, Hebei Province, China is the tallest existing pre-modern Chinese pagoda and tallest brick pagoda in the world, built in the 11th century during the Song dynasty (960–1279). The pagoda stands a ...

, which is today China's tallest surviving pre-modern

pagoda A pagoda is an Asian tiered tower with multiple eaves common to Nepal, India, China, Japan, Korea, Myanmar, Vietnam, and other parts of Asia. Most pagodas were built to have a religious function, most often Buddhist but sometimes Taoist, ...

. Under the early Republic, it was known as Dingxian ( then romanized "Tingsien" or "Ting Hsien") from its status as the seat of

Ding County Dingzhou, or Tingchow in Postal Map Romanization, and formerly called Ding County or Dingxian, is a county-level city in the prefecture-level city of Baoding, Hebei Province. As of 2009, Dingzhou had a population of 1.2 million. Dingzhou has 3 ...

. From 1926 to 1937, the county was the site of the National Association of Mass Education Movement's

Ting Hsien Experiment The Ding Xian Experiment () during the Republican period of Chinese history was a project in Rural Reconstruction sponsored by James Yen's Mass Education Movement (MEM) 中华平民教育促进会 in Ding Xian (Ding County), Hebei, some 200 mi ...

of the

Rural Reconstruction Movement The Rural Reconstruction Movement was started in China in the 1920s by Y.C. James Yen, Liang Shuming and others to revive the Chinese village. They strove for a middle way, independent of the Nationalist government but in competition with the ...

. In the 1990s, the

New Rural Reconstruction Movement New Rural Reconstruction (NRR, ) is an intellectual current and social movement initiated by Wen Tiejun and other activists to address the crisis they saw in the Chinese countryside at the start of the 21st century. As of 2009, at its core there a ...

maintained a training and outreach center.

Administrative divisions

Towns: * Qingfengdian (), Dongting (), Liqingu (), Mingyuedian (), Daxinzhuang (), Xingyi (), Zhuanlu (), Liuzao (), Pangcun (),

Gaopeng This is a list of township-level divisions of the province of Hebei, People's Republic of China (PRC). After province, prefecture, and county-level divisions, township-level divisions constitute the formal fourth-level administrative divisions of ...

(), Ziwei (), Dingningdian (), Dongwang (), Kaiyuan () Townships: * Dongliuchun Township (),

Zhoucun Township Zhoucun district () is a town and district of agricultural land inside Zibo city. The city covers and had an estimated population of 288,440 in 2013. Its main industry is textiles and furniture manufacture. The center of the commercial distric ...

(), Daluzhuang Township (), Yangjiazhuang Township (), Zhaocun Township (), Xicheng Township (), Xizhong Township (), Haotouzhuang Hui Ethnic Township ()

Climate

Transportation

Dingzhou is one of the transportation hubs in North China.

Railroads

* Jingguang railway: Dingzhou Railway Station * Jingshi Passenger Railway: Dingzhou East Railway Station * Shuohuang Railway: Dingzhou South Railway Station

Highways

Jingshi Expressway "Beijing" is from pinyin ''Běijīng,'' which is romanized from , the Chinese name for this city. The pinyin system of transliteration was approved by the Chinese government in 1958, but little used until 1979. It was gradually adopted by various ...

China National Highway 107 China's National Highway 107 runs from Beijing to Hong Kong SAR via Wuhan. It runs to approximately 2,698 km, and, on a map, runs broadly on a straight line from Beijing to Shenzhen. In 2013, under a new 2013-2030 plan by the National Devel ...

Places of interest

Dingzhou, Baoding, Hebei, China - panoramio (9)

: The tallest existing pre-modern Chinese pagoda * Dingzhou Confucius Temple: A well-preserved Confucius temple in Hebei

References

Citations

Bibliography

* Sidney D. Gamble, Foreword by Y.C. James Yen. Field work directed by Franklin Ching-han Lee. ''Ting Hsien, a North China Rural Community'' (New York: International Secretariat Institute of Pacific Relations, 1954; rpr Stanford University Press, 1968). xxv, 472p. 54009009. Sociological survey conducted in the 1920s and early 1930s.

External links

Dingzhou City Government Website

Report on excavation of Dingzhou tombs
{{Authority control Geography of Baoding County-level cities in Hebei