Zayul County ()
KNAB, retrieved 5 July 2021. THL’s Online Tibetan Transliteration Converter
an
THL’s Online Tibetan Phonetics Converter
invoked 31 August 2022. or Zayü County () is a county in the Nyingchi Prefecture in the southeastern part of the

Tibet Autonomous Region The Tibet Autonomous Region or Xizang Autonomous Region, often shortened to Tibet or Xizang, is a province-level autonomous region of the People's Republic of China in Southwest China. It was overlayed on the traditional Tibetan regions of ...

, China. The historical Zayul region is marked by the basin of the Zayul River, with its two branches: ''Rongto Chu'' (or the western Zayul River) and ''Zayul Chu'' (or the eastern Zayul River). The two branches join together near the town of

Rima Rima, also known as Rima the Jungle Girl, is the fictional heroine of W. H. Hudson's 1904 novel '' Green Mansions: A Romance of the Tropical Forest''. In it, Rima, a primitive girl of the shrinking rain forest of South America, meets Abel, a pol ...

. After the junction, the Zayul river enters India's

Arunachal Pradesh Arunachal Pradesh (, ) is a state in Northeastern India. It was formed from the erstwhile North-East Frontier Agency (NEFA) region, and became a state on 20 February 1987. It borders the states of Assam and Nagaland to the south. It share ...

where it is called Lohit. The Zayul county borders

India India, officially the Republic of India ( Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the ...

and

Burma Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John C. Wells, Joh ...

to the south and China's

Yunnan Yunnan , () is a landlocked province in the southwest of the People's Republic of China. The province spans approximately and has a population of 48.3 million (as of 2018). The capital of the province is Kunming. The province borders the ...

province to the southeast. To the northeast lies the Pome County and to the northwest the

Medog County Medog (in Tibetan) or Motuo (in Chinese) may refer to: * Mêdog County, a county in Tibet * Mêdog (village) Medog (in Tibetan Tibetan may mean: * of, from, or related to Tibet * Tibetan people, an ethnic group * Tibetan language: ** Classical T ...

. Its headquarters of the county is Kyigang, referred to as the Zayul Town . In 1950, Zayul County was the epicenter of a devastating earthquake.

Geography

Zayul County is located in an area of highly varying topography, lying just south of the

Tibetan Plateau The Tibetan Plateau (, also known as the Qinghai–Tibet Plateau or the Qing–Zang Plateau () or as the Himalayan Plateau in India, is a vast elevated plateau located at the intersection of Central, South and East Asia covering most of the T ...

in the mountainous region east of the

Himalayas The Himalayas, or Himalaya (; ; ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the planet's highest peaks, including the very highest, Mount Everest. Over ...

where the

Transhimalayas The Transhimalaya (also spelled Trans-Himalaya), or "Gangdise – Nyenchen Tanglha range" ( zh, s=冈底斯-念青唐古拉山脉, p=Gāngdǐsī-Niànqīngtánggǔlā Shānmài), is a mountain range in China, India and Nepal, extending in a we ...

transition to the Hengduan Mountains. Specifically, the county straddles the southern parts of the Baxoila Range, the eastern parts of the Kangri Karpo mountains, and the eastern parts of the

Mishmi Hills The Mishmi Hills are located at the northeastern tip of India, in northeastern Arunachal Pradesh. On the Chinese side, they form the southern parts of Nyingchi Prefecture in the Tibet Autonomous Region. These hills occur at the junction of Nor ...

. Elevations generally decrease from northwest to southeast, with a maximal variation of : in the county, areas near the southern border have an elevation of , while there are 10 peaks over , the highest being

Kawagarbo Kawa Garbo or Khawa Karpo (; also transcribed as Kawadgarbo, Khawakarpo, Moirig Kawagarbo, Kawa Karpo or Kha-Kar-Po), as it is known by local residents and pilgrims, or Kawagebo Peak (), is the highest mountain in the Chinese province of Yunnan. ...

in the Meili Xue Shan at . The county has an average elevation of . The primary rivers are the Zayul River through the central parts of the county and

Nu River , ''Mae Nam Salawin'' ( , name_etymology = , image = Sweet_View_of_Salween_River_in_Tang_Yan_Township,_Shan_State,_Myanmar.jpg , image_size = , image_caption = Salween River in Shan State, Myanmar , map ...

(Salween) in the east. The county has an area of . Besides India, Burma, and Yunnan, it borders

Zogang County Zogong County, ( Tibetan: མཛོ་སྒང་རྫོང་ Wylie mdzo sgang rdzong; Chinese: 左贡县; Pinyin: Zuǒgòng Xiàn) is a county of the Chamdo Prefecture in the Tibet Autonomous Region, Climate Transportation *China ...

to the north and

Mêdog County Mêdog, or Metok, or Motuo County (; ), also known as Pemako ( meaning "Lotus Array", ), is a county as well as a traditional region of the prefecture-level city of Nyingchi in the Tibet Autonomous Region of the People's Republic of China (PRC) ...

to the southwest.

Climate

Owing to its moderate elevation (for Tibet), Zayul County has a

subtropical highland climate An oceanic climate, also known as a marine climate, is the humid temperate climate sub-type in Köppen classification ''Cfb'', typical of west coasts in higher middle latitudes of continents, generally featuring cool summers and mild winters ...

( Köppen ''Cwb''), a rarity in Tibet, with mild and quite dry winters, and warm, rainy summers. The rainy season lasts from March to September, and June through August each average more than 20 days of rainfall per month. The monthly daily average temperature ranges from in January to in July, and the annual mean is . The frost-free period is 280 days annually. Here, the

diurnal temperature range In meteorology, diurnal temperature variation is the variation between a high air temperature and a low temperature that occurs during the same day. Temperature lag Temperature lag is an important factor in diurnal temperature variation: peak ...

is not large, maxing out at in November. Its climate is well-suited to support a variety of agricultural and forestry products.

Environment

The central parts of Zayul County contain a large isolated section of the

Northeastern Himalayan subalpine conifer forests The Northeastern Himalayan subalpine conifer forests are a temperate coniferous forests ecoregion of the middle to upper elevations of the eastern Himalayas and southeast Tibetan Plateau. The ecoregion occurs in southeastern Tibet Autonomou ...

throughout the Zayul River valley and its tributaries. The highland areas of Zayul contain Eastern Himalayan alpine shrub and meadows. The eastern parts of the county are classified as Nujiang Langcang Gorge alpine conifer and mixed forests. There are, however, extremely dry areas within the Nu Valley in Zayul that support mostly

succulents In botany, succulent plants, also known as succulents, are plants with parts that are thickened, fleshy, and engorged, usually to retain water in arid climates or soil conditions. The word ''succulent'' comes from the Latin word ''sucus'', meani ...

. Gecko ''

Hemiphyllodactylus zayuensis ''Hemiphyllodactylus zayuensis'' is a species of gecko. It is endemic to Tibet and named after its type locality, Zayü. Males measure about and females in snout–vent length Snout–vent length (SVL) is a morphometric measurement taken in ...

'', named after Zayul, is only known from the county.

Administrative divisions

The Zayul County has administration over three

towns A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

and three

townships A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Ca ...

: *Zayul Town () - County seat, * Xiachayu (Lower Zayul) (; ) *

Shangzayü Shangzayü (; bo, རྫ་ཡུལ) is a town of Zayü County, in southeastern Tibet Autonomous Region, People's Republic of China (PRC), located in a deep river valley from the county seat and bordering India's Arunachal Pradesh Arunach ...

(Upper Zayul) (; ) *

Goyul __NOTOC__ Goyul () or Goyü () is a township located in the Zayul County, Nyingchi Prefecture in eastern Tibet Autonomous Region, China.

Township (; ) *

Golag Golag () is a township in the northeast of Zayü County, Nyingchi, in the southeast of the Tibet Autonomous Region. See also *List of towns and villages in Tibet This is an alphabetical list of all populated places, including cities, towns a ...

Township (; ) *

Tsawarong Cawarong or Tsawarong (; ) is a township in Zayü County, Tibet Autonomous Region of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population e ...

Township (; ) The town of

(; ) , on the border with India's

, was once the headquarters of the Zayul region and referred to as the "Zayul Town". There are also numerous villages scattered throughout the valleys in Zayü County administered by their respective towns or townships. Puzang is part of Upper Zayul and Shaqiong is part of Lower Zayul.

Sino-Indian border dispute

China claims nearly the entire

as being part of Tibet, especially the Walong region in the Zayul River valley below Rima. The area was one of the theatres of the 1962

Sino-Indian War The Sino-Indian War took place between China and India from October to November 1962, as a major flare-up of the Sino-Indian border dispute. There had been a series of violent border skirmishes between the two countries after the 1959 Tibet ...

Notes

References

Bibliography

* * *

External links

Zayul County
OpenStreetMap, retrieved 2 October 2022.
Zayul river basin
OpenStreetMap, retrieved 2 October 2022. {{DEFAULTSORT:Zayu County Counties of Tibet Nyingchi