#8 Seven Ancient Chinese Capitals (1) - A look at Beijing
A study of ancient Chinese Capitals offers one a look at the history of China during the various stages of its unbroken civilisation.
The history of the seven ancient capitals of China offers one a glimpse into the various stages of Chinese long and unbroken civilisation given the country’s capital is where politics actions are in full swing.
Today’s article looks at Beijing and I will focus on the rest of the capitals in future posts.
Do you know Beijing was once known as Beiping?
Actually one could say the history of Beijing epitomises the rise, the fall and the rise again of China throughout its history.
Beijing 北京 literally means northern capital but such meaning does not offer you any clue on the history of the city as Chinese cities are known to have a long history behind them. Beijing was initially known as Beiping 北平 and below is its brief history which I translated into English based on the Baidu article (https://bit.ly/3cUq2E2):
❖ During the Warring States period, the state of Yan (燕国) had named a place called 右北平郡 which literally means "Right Beiping County".
❖Beiping county 北平郡 was officially named to replace 右北平郡 during the Western Jin西晋 (266-316 AD) and it was the first time Beiping appeared as an administrative district.
❖On September 12, 1368 (the first year of reign of King Hongwu of Ming Dynasty), the name Dadu大都 was changed to Beiping Prefecture 北平府 and Beiping was selected as it means "Northern Peace".
Dadu or commonly known as Yuan Dadu was the name of the capital during Yuan Dynasty and the location was in the suburbs of Beijing. So the Monguls were the first to make Beiping region the capital of China.
❖Subsequently, Zhu Di 朱棣, the third Emperor of Ming Dynasty, moved the capital from Nanjing to Beiping. As the capital of the Ming Dynasty, it was renamed Beijing in the 19th year of Yongle in the Ming Dynasty (1421). So the name of Beijing became official then.
The success of Zhu Di made for an interesting read as no feudal lord (藩王) had been successful to overthrow the current Emperor until Zhu Di came along. This is because starting from Qin Dynasty, the Emperors had been practising the system of centralisation of authority (中央集权制度) which undermined the power of local governments and feudal lords. Would probably write about it in future on the success factors of Zhu Di.
❖However, Beijing returned to its root of Beiping after the end of Northern Expedition which was a military campaign launched by the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Kuomintang (KMT) against the Beiyang government and other regional warlords in 1926. The capital was moved back to Nanjing and Beijing was known as Special City of Beiping (北平特别市).
But Beijing rose from the ashes again after the civil war ended in 1949. In essence, as the history of Beijing has shown, one needs to understand Chinese history in order to understand contemporary China.
Below is a mesmerising video on Beijing as it is a superb justaposition of old and modern Beijing.
铛铛车 Dangdangche
Some notes on the video:
You will see the below tram in the video:
The tram is known as 铛铛车 Dangdangche.
铛 dang here means a clanging sound and it was coined because when the trams first became operational in 1924, the driver had copper bells tied to the foot and when he stopped the tram, it created the “dang dang” sound. So it was probably like a buzzer to tell the passengers to alight if they had reached their intended destinations.
Based on the visit Beijing website (https://www.visitbeijing.com.cn/article/47QkZmZ54Hz) , it says “铛铛车”外表虽然复古，内置却十分现代。这些铛铛车都是纯电动的空调车，车辆视频监控、GPS定位、WiFi等设备。
Translation :
“Although the appearance of dangdangche looks retro, but its interior is very modernised. These dangdangche are pure electric air-conditioned vehicles with features such as vehicle video surveillance system, GPS positioning, WiFi and other equipments.”
Dangdangche is a feature of 前门大街Qianmen Street which is a 商业街 i.e. literally commercial street that is similar to the meaning of high street in the UK.