| Ancient Capital Changan
Changan, former name of Xi'an, the capital of Shaanxi Province today, was a famous ancient city of culture in China. Surrounded by mountains and rivers, in a location favoured by nature, it was successively the capital of eleven dynasties in Chinese history, including Zhou, Qin, Han, Sui and Tang. The Chinese characters "chang" and "an" stand for "eternal, peace" in English, indicating that the emperors and kings wished that their descendants could forever live there in peace.
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| Ancient City of Jiaohe
The Ancient City of Jiaohe is one of the world's architectural wonders hiding in the Yarnaz Valley, 10 kilometers west of Turpan City. Shaped like a willow leaf, the ancient city of Jiaohe has a history of 2,300 years and lies between two rivers on a loess plateau atop a cliff of over 30 meters. Jiaohe is 1,760 meters long from northwest to southeast and is 300 meters at its widest, with an area of 430,000 square meters.
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| Ancient Gaochang City
The Ancient Gaochang City is located about 40 kilometers east to Turban City in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region.
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| Capital City of Shang at Yanshi
The ruins of an ancient city some 3,600 years old have been dug out after 15 years' exploration and excavation in Yanshi, Henan Province. The intact city walls and palaces reveal it to have been the capital city of the early Shang Dynasty. The area was named Yanshi Shang City Ruins.
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| Changle Palace
Chang'an (today's Xi'an City in Shaanxi Province) was originally a county neighboring Xianyang on the southern side of Weihe River in the Qin Dynasty (221-206BC). As a communications hub, it later became a strategic place many military commanders scrambled for.
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| Forbidden City
Lying at the center of Beijing, the Forbidden City, called Gu Gong in Chinese, used to be the imperial palace of the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1911). It is called the Palace Museum now. It lies 1 kilometer north of the Tian'anmen Square, with its south gate, the Gate of Devine Might (Shenwumen), facing the Jingshan Park.
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| Hangzhou
Capital of Zhejiang Province, Hangzhou is a well-known tourist city at home and abroad. It lies on the lower reaches of the Qiantang River and is the southern end of the l794-kllometer-long Grand Canal (Beijing-Hangzhou Canal). With an area of 16,596 square kilometers, it embraces six urban districts and seven suburban counties.
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| Jinan City of Chu State
The Jinan City of the Chu State is located 5 kilometers north to Jiangling County in Hubei Province.
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| Kaifeng -- Ancient Capital
The city of Kaifeng is one ht East Henan Plain south of the Yellow River. During the Spring and Autumn Period, the place became the fief of Duke Zaung (757-701 B.C.) of the State of Zheng, who started to build a city and named it Kaifeng, meaning "opening up new territory." It was also called Bianliang after the Warring States Period (475-221 B.C.).
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| Lhasa's Potala Palace
In Tibet, there was a kind of government structure called "Zong Shan". "Zong" means a local Tibetan administrative unit, equivalent to a county in interior areas. The government center of a "Zong" was mostly constructed on the hill, thus becoming a castle called "Zong Shan". Lhasa's Potala Palace, the greatest building in Tibet, is both the highest "Zong Shan" and the temple of the gods of Tibetan Buddhism.
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| Nanjing - Ancient Dynastic Capital
Lying in the southwestern part of Jiangsu Province, Nanjing is the provincial capital and the province's political, economic and cultural center, with an area of 860 square kilometers. The city's strategic position of being on the southern bank of the Yangtze River and the junction close to the Great Canal made it a traffic hub for centuries.
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| Palaces
A palace was a structure of the utmost maturity, highest accomplishment and largest scale in China's development, clearly reflecting the characteristics of traditional Chinese culture which stressed a stable social and political order.
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| Shenyang Imperial Palace
The Shenyang Imperial Palace, one of the two most intact imperial group-buildings ever existing in China, is located at Shenyang City, Liaoning Province. It enjoys equal popularity as the Forbidden City. The Shenyang Imperial Palace was built in 1625 by Nurhachi when the Manchus declared Shenyang to be their capital. When Shenyang was in the control of the Japanese aggressors in the 1930s, the name of the palace was changed into Fengtian Palace Museum. On August 5, 1986, it was finally settled down as the Shenyang Palace Museum.
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| Site of Pingliangtai Ancient City
The Site of Pingliangtai Ancient City is located in the southwest corner of Dazhu Village, four kilometers southeast of Huaiyang County in Henan Province.
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| Stunning Capital of Xia Dynasty Unearthed
Chinese archaeologists recently found a large-scale building foundation in Erlitou Ruins of Yanshi, central China's Henan Province, which belongs to the later period of Xia Dynasty. The discovery, the first of its kind in China, again excited the archaeological field after the heated discussion on the division of Xia and Shang dynasties .
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| The Weiyang Palace of the Han Dynasty
Chang'an (today's Xi'an City of Shaanxi Province) was the capital of China in the Han Dynasty (206BC-220AD), and was constructed and expanded on the basis of the Xingle Palace of the Qin Dynasty (221-206BC). The northern rampart was close to Weishui River and southern rampart was built along walls of the palace. Buildings in the Chang'an City were mainly palaces, among which the Changle Palace and the Weiyang Palace were the most famous ones.
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| Zheng Han Ancient City
The Zheng Han Ancient City is located at the joint of the Shuangji River and the Yellow River near the city gate of Xinzheng City in Henan Province.
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