Nanking

Nanking, China: see Nanjing.

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Nanjing

 or Nan-ching conventional Nanking

City (pop., 2003 est.: 2,966,000), capital of Jiangsu province, east-central China. Located on the southeastern bank of the Yangtze River (Chang Jiang) northwest of Shanghai, the site has been inhabited for thousands of years. The present city was founded in 1368 by the Ming dynasty, which had its capital there (1368–1421). It was taken by the British in the Opium Wars of 1842 and was largely destroyed in 1864 after having served (since 1853) as the capital of the Taiping revolutionaries. Nanjing was opened as a treaty port in 1899 and was the Nationalist capital from 1928 to 1937; it was then taken by the Japanese, and it was the site of the Nanjing Massacre in the Sino-Japanese War of 1937–45. It was taken by communist forces in 1949 and became the provincial capital in 1952. Nanjing is a port city and a major industrial and communications centre with a number of universities and colleges. Nearby monuments include mausoleums of Sun Yat-sen and a Ming emperor.

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Nanjing, Nanking, Nan-ching

a port in E central China, capital of Jiangsu province, on the Yangtze River: capital of the Chinese empire and a literary centre from the 14th to 17th centuries; capital of Nationalist China (1928--37); site of a massacre of about 300 000 civilians by the invading Japanese army in 1937; university (1928). Pop.: 2 806 000 (2005 est.)

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Nanking 

a city in China, located on the right bank of the lower Yangtze River. A major national economic and cultural center. Capital of Kiangsu Province. Population, 1,670,000 (1965, estimate).

Nanking is an important transportation junction, with a river port accessible to oceangoing ships. A two-tiered railroad and highway bridge spans the Yangtze at Nanking. Local industrial products include machine tools, turbines, electronic instruments, electrical equipment, trucks, agricultural machinery, metal products, chemicals (particularly chemical fertilizers and synthetic fibers), cement, textiles, and food. A thermal electric power plant is located in the city. Nanking is a scientific and cultural center, with a university, eight other institutions of higher education, a museum, an observatory, a botanical garden, and a zoo.

Nanking was founded in 472 B.C. At various times it was known as Chinling, Moling, Chienyeh, Chienk’ang, and Kiangning. Beginning in the third century A.D., it served as the capital for such major feudal dynasties as the Wu (third century) and the Eastern Chin, Liu-Sung, Southern Ch’i, Liang, and Ch’en (fourth through sixth centuries). Nanking was also the capital of China during the initial period of the rule of the Ming dynasty (1368–1421). From 1421 to 1911 it was the center of the Chiangnan vicegerency (Kiangsu, Kianghsi, and Anhwei provinces). From March 1853 through 1864, under the name of T’ienching (“heavenly capital”), it was the capital of the state established during the Taiping uprising.

Nanking was a leading center of the bourgeois Hsin-hai Revolution (1911–13); from the end of December 1911 until April 1912 it was the capital of China’s first republican government, led by Sun Yat-sen. From April 1912 until 1927, Nanking was the capital of Kiangsu Province. After Chiang Kai’shek’s counterrevolutionary coup, of Apr. 12, 1927, the city became China’s capital. In December 1937, Nanking fell to the Japanese and from 1940 to 1945 was the site of the puppet government set up by the Japanese and headed by Wang Ching-wei. Again from 1946 through 1949, Nanking served as the sent of government of the Republic of China. The city was liberated from the Kuomintang by the People’s Liberation Army on Apr. 23, 1949.

Nanking has an irregular layout. The Imperial City, built in the 14th and 15th centuries according to an elaborate plan and surrounded by a massive stone wall in 1400, is located in the eastern part of the city. Noteworthy architectural monuments of Nanking include the stone Porcelain Pagoda of the Ch’ihsia-shih temple, built during the tenth century; the Wu-liang-tien, a beamless brick temple, constructed in 1398 within the Ling-koshih temple; portions of the city wall that date from the Ming era (from the 14th through the 17th centuries); the imperial tombs of the Liang dynasty (ruled A.D. 502–557); with their monumental stone statuary of fantastic animals; the tomb of Chu Yüan-chang (14th century), with stone figures of officials, warriors, and animals; and the tomb of Sun Yat-sen, constructed 1926–29.

REFERENCE

Sushkina, N. N. U drevnikh pamiatnikov. Moscow, 1959.