The Pingyao ancient city

    On December 2, 1997, in Naples of Italy, the World Heritage Committee of UESCO passed resolution at the 21st conference deciding to include the old town of Pingyao within the World Cultural Heritages, which is the first in China.
    "The Pingyao ancient city is an excellent example of cities of hanzu in the Ming and Qing dynasties, and it has preserved all its unique features well and demonstrated to people a distinct and complete picture scroll of the development of culture, society, economy and religion in the history of China "
    Pingyao's charm not only depends on that she is an ancient city preserved well but also depends on that she could show us the rise and fall of Shanxi
    Business: in the west street of Pingyao, the famous "Rishengchang”, which engaged in money exchange, deposits and loans, was set up. It was the first "piaohao". The south street of Pingyao still keeps the flavor of the Ming and Qing dynasties. The buildings for trades are old but not dead. We can see the flourishing at that time from these buildings.
    Pingyao's charm also depends on its peculiar custom. The wedding and burial ceremonies are diversified and exquisite. In a word, there is endless focus for you.
    Now clever people of Pingyao are clean up the modern air and dressing it to be its original features. They are using the wealth their ancestors handing down to create the new flourishing and new tales. The PIP Festival to be held in Pingyao also will give Pingyao a new chance.

The feature of the Pingyao ancient city

    The Pingyao ancient city is a big cultural relics made up of the ancient city wall, streets and buildings. Now, it is rarely to see an ancient city being preserved that well, in addition, the cultural relics with important historical, artistic and scientific values also have been preserved.
    Pingyao city was first built in Western Zhou Dynasty, and has a history of 1500 years. The ancient city wall now in existence was built over the old one, which was renovated in 1370 and it has a history of over 600 years.
    Pingyao ancient city is square in shape. There are 6 gates in the city, including one south gate, one north gate, two east gates and two west gats; There are four watchtowers on the four corners of the city wall. On the southeast corner of the old city wall stands "Kuixing tower" and " Wenchang attic". There is city moat around the city, along the moat are the Yang, Liu, Huai trees. The city is small but it is impregnable.
    Pingyao ancient city have a name of "the Tortoise City " , it covers 2.25 square kilometers and the City Building is its center . 4 main streets, 8 streets and 72 lanes combine to a big picture of the Eight Trigrams. The city gate, main streets and streets connect with each other tightly. They are crisscross, clear in primary and secondary and they are in perfect order. Along the main streets lies lots of shops. All of those reflect the flourishing of Pingyao at that time.
    The gorgeous 3-storyed wood structure "Shilou " tower in the business commercial district, form a sharp contrast with streets and residential houses near the "Shilou" tower. So it also be called "Jinjing Building”. That is one of the eight scenes of Pingyao city.
    Pingyao city has a long commercial history, and Pingyao city is one of the main original gathering places of business people in Shanxi. Early in the 20th century, they had been 22 "piaohao" in Pingyao city with 400 branches throughout the country. They had ever monopolized the finance of China. Lots of buildings were set up at that time. Now, they still keep the flavor of that time.
    Pingyao city has preserved lots of ancient buildings and cultural relics. All of them show us the great attainments of the wood structure and painted sculpture. The polished lacquerware and the braised beef of Pingyao city represent the lacquerware and the diet culture of Pingyao city.
    In a word, Pingyao is a famous tour spot for its cultural relics different from the common run.

The culture of residential houses

    " In Chinese ancient capitals, palaces are the concentrate of history. However, in Pingyao city, residential houses are the concentrate of history."
    The old residential houses are the cultural marrow of the ancient Pingyao city. There are 3,797 old siheyuans including more than 400 houses being preserved well. Thus, Pingyao ancient city has turned to be a great museum of old buildings.
    The residential houses have kept the flavor of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Now, people still live in the houses. In fact, the old residential houses are the combination of traditional art of buildings and theory of geomantic omen. The reception center of Pingyao is developing and managing ten representative residential houses, and also made two of them tour hotels of folk custom. That gives visitors chances to really observe and learn from the culture of the residential houses. The elegant streets, aged houses, wandering old people, naughty people, all combine to form an ancient painting of people's daily life. All of that can be your focus. They are worth photoing.

The "Rishengchang" remittance bank

    Founded in the third year of Daoguang in Qing Dynasty (1823), the "rishengchang" Remittance Bank specialized in silver (used as currency) remittance, deposit and loan business. It is regarded as the originator and a milestone in Chinese financial development.
    Three years after the "Rishengchang" was founded, its branches have scattered in Shandong, Henan, Liaoning, Jiangsu etc. In 1840, Shanxi "piaohao" was not only made up of Pingyao "piaohao" but Qixian and Taigu "piaohao"s. There were 11 remittance banks then in Shanxi. With the development of Shanxi business, there were 43 remittance banks in Shanxi at last. They had 500 branches in 85 cities across country and in Tokyo, Osaka，Kobe of Japan, Singapore, Moscow of Russia and Calcutta of India. At that time, Chinese finance had almost been monopolized by Shanxi "piaohao". There were 22 "piaohao"s in Pingyao with 404 branches. The "Rishengchang" enjoyed great credit., and it was famous near and far.
    Located in the west street, Rishengchang covers an area of 1,700 square meters. The economical use of land and deliberate structure show us exquisite design. After being greatly rebuilt in 1995, "Rishengchang" has been renamed "the museum of Chinese `piaohao`", here we can see the complete managing business of Rishengchang, lots of valuable materials and material objects. In addition, there are lots of history material showing us something about Pingyao piaohao, Shanxi piaohao and Chinese piaohao. In a word, we can feel the up and down of Chinese piaohao in "Rishengchang"

The Town God's Temple

    The Town God's Temple was first built in the Northern Song Dynasty.
    It was twice reestablished because of the two fire disasters in 1544 and 1859.
    The Town God's Temple and the County Office are symmetrical, the south street as their axis of symmetry. The Town God's Temple is made up of Liucaofu, Tuditang, Zaojunmiao and Caishenmiao, and it is preserved well now.
    The Town God's Temple has rich intension of history and culture. Here, the Buddhism, the Taoism and the residential customs have combined to one.
    The buildings of the Town God's Temple are very meticulous and exquisite. It shows us the wealth of the Shanxi businessmen at that time.

The City Wall, the Double Forest Temple and the Zhenguo Temple

    The Pingyao ancient city presents a vast array of cultural relics, including three important cultural relics subject to protection institutions at the state. They are the city wall, the Zhenguo Temple and the Double Forest Temple.
    The city wall was first built in the Western Zhou Dynasty and was enlarged in 1370, later, was repaired for several times late in Ming and Qing dynasties. It keeps the style of the city wall early in the Ming and Qing dynasties, powerful and broad in scale. The city wall is 6,157 meters in circumference. The wall body is compact earth and is covered by bricks and stones. The wall measures 6 to 10 meters high, every 50 meters on the outside wall a horse face building protrudes, altogether, there are 72 watchtowers and 3000 crenels, they represent 72 excellent disciples and 3000 followers of Confucian.
    It was called "Tortoise City", it sits at the east bank of Fen river and at the foot of the Taiyue mountain. The south gate was looked as the head of tortoise; the two wells near out of the gate as the eyes of tortoise; the north gate as its tail; the east and west gates as its legs. The up and down west gates and the up east gate face to the south, like three legs stretching forward. Only the down east gate faces to east. According to the tale, people were afraid that the tortoise would run away, so they straiten its legs with force and tied it to a tower 10 miles away from it. The city wall and the ancient streets combine to form a big picture of the Eight Diagrams, like the figure of the tortoise. The design expresses people's hope for solidity and longevity.
    You can make a circuit around the city wall especially at nightfall. That will be a special experience for you. There will be a desolate and absolutely beautiful scene before you.
    The Shuanlin Temple is situated in the Qiaotou Village 7km southwest of the ancient Pingyao city, first built in 571. It has now a history of 1400 years. In the temple, most of the buildings were set up in Ming and Qing dynasties. The temple faces to the south and covers 14,000 square meters which including 10 main halls and 3 meditation rooms. The temples are on a platform 3 meters high like a castle.
    The Shuanglin Temple is famous for its colored clay figurines. There are 2052 figurines of Song, Yuan, Ming, Qing dynasty, the big is several meters high, the small is tens of centimeters. The figurines, in different figure, are lifelike. They are indeed the precious flowers in the field of art.
    The Zhenguo Temple is 12 km east to the county proper. It was first built in 963. The whole temple sits against north and faces south. There are 13 halls and more than 10 huge figures of Buddha in the temple. The mountain gate and the Tianwang hall combine into one. The Wanfo Hall is the main hall of the temple and it is the earliest wood structure in China. In addition, the colored clay figurines and frescos in the temple are of high art value