An Overview of Nanjing's History

As a famous historic city, Nanjing ranks with Xi'an, Luoyang, Beijing, Hangzhou and Kaifeng as six major ancient Chinese capitals. The fossils of Homo sapiens, those of ape-men's skull caps discovered at Tangshan in the east suburbs of Nanjing indicate that Nanjing was home to a large community of human beings in the late period of the mid-Pleistocene epoch 350,000 years ago. As far back as the late Spring and Autum Period (770-475 B.C.) Prince Fu Chai of the state Wu erected a "metallurgical city" in the vicity of present-day Chaotaingong, where large quantities of bronze vessels were cast and smelt. After the conquest of Wu by the state of Yue in 472 B.C., under the supervision of Minister Fan Li a "Yue city" was built at Changganli outside today's Zhonghua Gate. This even, which took place almost 2,470 years ago, resulted in the emergence of a walled city at Nanjing.

In A.D. 229 Emperor Sun Quan of the Wu Kingdom in the Three Kingdosm Period made Nanjing (known as Jianye at the time) his capital, which had its central axis at today's Taiping Road, with the Qinhuai River in the south and Xuanwu Lake in the north, and was crisscrossed by bustling streets. After that, Nanjing was again made antional capital (then know as Jiankang) of Eastern Jin (317-420) and of Song, Qi, Liang and Chen in the Southern Dynasties Period (420-589), thereby earning for the city its fame as the "ancient capital of six dynasties". Nanjing in those periods boasted a brilliant culture, a thriving commerce, and a large population of anything up to 1,400,000 people. Nanjing became the nation's political center again in 1368, when Zhu Yuanzhang founded the Ming Dynasty and named the city his capital. It took him 21 years to build a wall 33.65 kilometers in girth around Nanjing, then the largest city in the world.

In 1853, when the Taiping peasant insurgents stormed into Nanjing they made it the capital of their Taiping Heavenly Kongdom and renamed it Tianjing, a name which stayed for only 11 years. Dr. Sun Yat-sen established the Republic of China ans was chosen as its Provisional President in Nanjing on December 29, 1911, after the victory of the 1911 Revolution that ended the monarchy of the Qing Dynasty. Nanjing became the capital of the Republic on April 18, 1927, when Chiang Kai-shek proclaimed the inauguration of the National Govenrment there. The People's Liberation Army forces conquered the Presidential Palace and established the people's government on April 24, 1949 after Mao Zedong and Zhu De issued the order to launche an attack across the country.

Geographic Location of Nanjing

Nanjing, the capital city of Jiangsu Province, is an old and beautiful city. It is located as a plain within the middle lower reaches of the Yangtze River, facing the Ocean in the east, and not far from Anhui Province and Zhejiang Province in the south, near the Hubei Province and Henan Provice in the west and Shandong Province in the north. As a city close to rivers and lakes, Nanjing is proud of its well-situated geographical conditions and abundant natural resources. Also, Nanjing is a well-known ancient cultural city. Since the 3rd century AD, it has been the capitals of 10 dynasties or regimes, i.e., the Eastern Wu, Eastern Jin, Song, Qi, Liang, Chen, Southern Tang, Early Ming, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and the Republic of China. As one of the "six ancient cities" in China, Nanjing has had been the center of economy, politics and culture of middle lower reaches of Yangtze River in ancient and modern times, and that has been leaving behind effulgent traditional culture.

Today, as one of four core cities in the Yangtze Delta, Nanjing is increasingly playing a great role in the economic zone of the national macro productivity layout. Nanjing is a comprehensive industrial base region, an important communication & transportation centers and one of the four scientific research & education centers in East of China. It is also the second largest business center next to Shanghai in the east of China.

Welcome to China2Go, the talking Chinese phrase book for Windows Mobile Pocket PC and Palm OS. Featuring crystal clear voice recorded by a real person, this product is a great travel companion and an ideal tool to learn Chinese! With our cutting edge voice compression technology, this product includes more than 1000 phrases, their Chinese translation, and the voice in only a few megabytes. Supports all Windows Mobile Pocket PCs. H&H China2Go Talking Phrase Book for Windows Mobile