Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture is an

autonomous prefecture Autonomous prefectures ( zh, c=自治州, p=zìzhìzhōu) are one type of autonomous administrative divisions of China, autonomous administrative division in China, existing at the Prefecture-level divisions of China, prefectural level, with eith ...

in northwestern

Yunnan Yunnan; is an inland Provinces of China, province in Southwestern China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 47.2 million (as of 2020). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the Chinese provinces ...

province, China. Covering an area of , it is bordered by the

Tibet Autonomous Region The Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), often shortened to Tibet in English or Xizang in Pinyin, Hanyu Pinyin, is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People's Republic of China. It was established in 1965 to replace the ...

to the northwest,

Sichuan Sichuan is a province in Southwestern China, occupying the Sichuan Basin and Tibetan Plateau—between the Jinsha River to the west, the Daba Mountains to the north, and the Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau to the south. Its capital city is Cheng ...

province to the northeast, and other parts of Yunnan province to the southwest and southeast;

Nujiang Lisu Autonomous Prefecture Nujiang Lisu Autonomous Prefecture is an autonomous prefecture in northwestern Yunnan, China. The titular ethnic group is the Lisu people, who make up nearly half of the prefecture's population. The state is long and narrow, with an area of 14,5 ...

and

Lijiang Lijiang ( zh, s= ), formerly romanized as Likiang, is a prefecture-level city in the northwest of Yunnan Province, China. It has an area of and had a population of 1,253,878 at the 2020 census whom 288,787 lived in the built-up area (metro) ...

, respectively. Its capital and largest city is

Shangri-La Shangri-La is a fictional place in Tibet's Kunlun Mountains, Uses the spelling 'Kuen-Lun'. described in the 1933 novel '' Lost Horizon'' by the British author James Hilton. Hilton portrays Shangri-La as a mystical, harmonious valley, gently ...

. Diqing Prefecture is divided into three county-level divisions: Shangri-La, Deqin County, and

Weixi Lisu Autonomous County Weixi Lisu Autonomous County is an autonomous county of Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, in northwest Yunnan Yunnan; is an inland Provinces of China, province in Southwestern China. The province spans approximately and has a popul ...

. They were all formerly under the administration of Lijiang (located southeast of this prefecture)."System Evolution"
via official website of Diqing government (in Chinese). Accessed April 25, 2015. Diqing Prefecture was established in 1957 and named by its first governor.

Etymology

The prefecture's name is derived from the Tibetan word (), which means "auspicious place". In Chinese, the name is written with the characters () and (), which mean "to enlighten" and "to celebrate", respectively. Alternate English names include ''Dechen'' and ''Deqing''.

Transport

Air

Diqing Shangri-La Airport, also known simply as Diqing Airport, is one of the biggest airports in the northwest of the Yunnan Province. It is located about from the center of Shangri-La City. There are flights to

Lhasa Lhasa, officially the Chengguan District of Lhasa City, is the inner urban district of Lhasa (city), Lhasa City, Tibet Autonomous Region, Southwestern China. Lhasa is the second most populous urban area on the Tibetan Plateau after Xining ...

Chengdu Chengdu; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: ; Chinese postal romanization, previously Romanization of Chinese, romanized as Chengtu. is the capital city of the Chinese province of Sichuan. With a ...

Beijing Beijing, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Peking, is the capital city of China. With more than 22 million residents, it is the world's List of national capitals by population, most populous national capital city as well as ...

(via

Kunming Kunming is the capital and largest city of the province of Yunnan in China. The political, economic, communications and cultural centre of the province, Kunming is also the seat of the provincial government. During World War II, Kunming was a Ch ...

), Shanghai Pudong,

Shenzhen Shenzhen is a prefecture-level city in the province of Guangdong, China. A Special economic zones of China, special economic zone, it is located on the east bank of the Pearl River (China), Pearl River estuary on the central coast of Guangdong ...

(via

Guiyang Guiyang; Mandarin pronunciation: ; Chinese postal romanization, alternatively as Kweiyang is the capital of Guizhou, Guizhou province in China. It is centrally located within the province, on the Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau, eastern part of the Yun ...

Guangzhou Guangzhou, Chinese postal romanization, previously romanized as Canton or Kwangchow, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Guangdong Provinces of China, province in South China, southern China. Located on the Pearl River about nor ...

and

Xishuangbanna Xishuangbanna, sometimes shortened to Banna, is one of the eight autonomous prefectures of Yunnan Province. The autonomous prefecture for Dai people is in the extreme south of Yunnan province, China, bordering both Myanmar and Laos. Xishuangbanna ...

Road

Highways are the main means of transportation to reach Diqing Prefecture. The major highway in this prefecture is China National Highway 214 (a Yunnan-

Tibet Tibet (; ''Böd''; ), or Greater Tibet, is a region in the western part of East Asia, covering much of the Tibetan Plateau and spanning about . It is the homeland of the Tibetan people. Also resident on the plateau are other ethnic groups s ...

Qinghai Qinghai is an inland Provinces of China, province in Northwestern China. It is the largest provinces of China, province of China (excluding autonomous regions) by area and has the third smallest population. Its capital and largest city is Xin ...

highway abbreviated "G214"). There are also direct bus routes to

and

Panzhihua Panzhihua ( zh, c=攀枝花, p=Pānzhīhuā), formerly Dukou ( zh, labels=no, c=渡口), is a prefecture-level city located in the far south of Sichuan province, China, at the confluence of the Jinsha and Yalong Rivers. It has an administrative ...

(Sichuan).

Demography

Subdivisions

Diqing Prefecture is divided into three county-level divisions:

, Deqin County, and

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Hanzi Chinese characters are logographs used to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represent the only one ...

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Hanyu Pinyin Hanyu Pinyin, or simply pinyin, officially the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, is the most common romanization system for Standard Chinese. ''Hanyu'' () literally means ' Han language'—that is, the Chinese language—while ''pinyin'' literally ...

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, , , , {{nowrap, {{Transliteration, bo, Sêmgyi'nyida Chongkyir , {{Transliteration, bo, sems kyi nyi zla grong khyer , 172,988 , 11,613 , 14.89 , ---------- style="height:90px;" , Deqin County , {{lang, zh-hans, 德钦县 , {{Transliteration, zh, Déqīn Xiàn , {{bo-textonly, བདེ་ཆེན་རྫོང་། ---- {{bo-textonly, མཇོལ་རྫོང་། , {{Transliteration, bo, Dêqên Zong ---- {{Transliteration, bo, Jol Zong , {{Transliteration, bo, bde chen rdzong ---- {{Transliteration, bo, mjol rdzong , 66,589 , 7,596 , 8.76 , ---------- style="height:90px;" ,

, {{lang, zh-hans, 维西傈僳族
自治县 , {{Transliteration, zh, Wéixī Lìsùzú
Zìzhìxiàn , {{bo-textonly, འབའ་ལུང་ལི་སུའུ་རིགས་རང་སྐྱོང་རྫོང་། , {{Transliteration, bo, Balung Lisurig Ranggyong Zong , {{Transliteration, bo, 'ba' lung li su'u rigs rang skyong rdzong , 160,605 , 4,661 , 34.45

History

This prefecture is in the southern part of a historical region called

Kham Kham (; ) is one of the three traditional Tibet, Tibetan regions, the others being Domey also known as Amdo in the northeast, and Ü-Tsang in central Tibet. The official name of this Tibetan region/province is Dotoe (). The original residents of ...

, which belonged to the

Tibetan Empire The Tibetan Empire (,) was an empire centered on the Tibetan Plateau, formed as a result of expansion under the Yarlung dynasty heralded by its 33rd king, Songtsen Gampo, in the 7th century. It expanded further under the 38th king, Trisong De ...

many centuries ago. After the decline of that empire in the 9th century, peripheral areas like southern Kham remained part of Tibet more in an ethnographical than a political sense. As a practical matter, by the mid-1700s, the Tibetan Government had mostly lost control of Kham to Manchu (Qing) China and that situation lasted until the end of the Manchu Dynasty in 1912. Southern Kham along with other parts of Yunnan were ruled by the

Yunnan clique The Yunnan clique () was one of several mutually hostile cliques that split from the Beiyang Government in the Republic of China's warlord era. It was named for Yunnan Province. History Kunming Uprising When the 1911 Revolution began, Cai E ...

from 1915 until 1927. Then it was controlled by Governor and warlord Long (Lung) Yun until near the end of the

Chinese Civil War The Chinese Civil War was fought between the Kuomintang-led Nationalist government, government of the Republic of China (1912–1949), Republic of China and the forces of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Armed conflict continued intermitt ...

, when Du Yuming removed him under the order of Chiang Kai-shek. There are three county-level divisions in this prefecture:

(formerly Zhongdian), Deqin County and

(formerly Weixi) and they all were under the administration of

. The Autonomous Prefecture was established in 1957 and named "Diqing" by its first governor. During the remainder of the 20th century, the prefecture's capital was called Zhongdian but was renamed on December 17, 2001 as Shangri-La City (other spellings: Semkyi'nyida, Xianggelila or Xamgyi'nyilha) after the fictional land of

in the 1933 James Hilton novel '' Lost Horizon'', with an eye toward promoting tourism in the area. On June 25, 2007 the Pudacuo National Park was established on {{convert, 500, mi2, km2 in this prefecture. On January 11, 2014, there was a major fire in the 1,000-year-old Dukezong Tibetan neighborhood of the capital city Shangri-La, causing much damage and hardship.{{cite news, url=http://www.toledoblade.com/World/2014/01/11/Night-fire-burns-for-hours-destroys-ancient-Tibetan-town-in-southwest-China-s-Shangri-La-county.html, title=Night fire burns for hours, destroys ancient Tibetan town in southwest China's Shangri-La county, publisher=Toledo Blade, date=January 11, 2014

Notes

{{Notelist

References

{{Reflist

External links

{{Commons category, Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture
Official Website
(in Chinese)

via chinadiscover.net. {{Yunnan {{Prefectural-level divisions of the People's Republic of China {{Tibetan autonomy in the People's Republic of China {{DEFAULTSORT:Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture Tibetan autonomous prefectures Prefecture-level divisions of Yunnan