A Study On New City Of Nanjing In Late Yuan Dynasty And Early Ming Dynasty

The "New City" in this thesis refers to the "City of Emperor of Wu" constructed during the ruling period of Zhu Yuanzhang in late Yuan Dynasty.It is a city well known,and in the meantime unfamiliar,to those who specializes in the historical and archaeological study of Nanjing City.It is well known to the researchers in the sense that the "New City" was mentioned in Memoir during Ruling of Founder of Ming Dynasty,which was later extensively cited and honored as the most important source of historical data on city construction history of Nanjing.It is unfamiliar because in the interpretation of this important historical data,the "New City" has been marginalized due to the interference from relevant records in History of the Ming Dynasty,as some scholars equate it with the "Rebuilt City of Yingtian" described in History of the Ming Dynasty,and thus step to study the city wall and city construction of Nanjing.Researchers tend to overlook the existence of "New City" which once had independent city characteristics,clear time boundaries and integral land coverage.Such overlook consequently results in the situation that the "New City" of Nanjing has not gained the sufficient research attention it deserves.In view of the above,this thesis attempts to address the logic behind the neglect of "New City",restart the fundamental research of "New City",clarify the relation between "New City" and Capital City,and restore the historical position of the "New City",by combining methodologies of historical,archaeological and field studies from the perspective of solving the mystery of Redundant Wall.This thesis consists of the following seven parts,Part One-"Introduction".This part aims to present the background and thoughts of writing this thesis by stating the purpose,literary review,academic significance and research approach of the thesis.Part Two-"Study on the ’Redundant Wall’".From the perspective of research on nature and origin of the "Redundant Wall" and by taking advantage of textual research,this part presumes that "Redundant Wall" is part of the north wall of "New City" in late Yuan Dynasty and that it was completed after undergoing two phases,i.e.the initial construction and later consolidation,and was finally retained when the north wall of "New City" was dismantled in early Ming Dynasty.The reliability of such presumption is subject to the detailed research on the construction of "New City"behind the issue of "Redundant Wall".Part Three-"Study on the Construction Time of ’New City’".This part carries out textual criticism and concludes that the construction of "New City" began in the 24th year(1364 A.D)of Zhizheng Period in Yuan Dynasty and its main body was completed in the first year(1367 A.D)of Emperor Wu,which provides the basis for the research in the following partsPart Four-"Land Coverage and Length of ’New City’".This part points out the specific route of completed north wall of "New City" from "Redundant Wall" to Qingliang Mountain,and at the same time determines for the first time the length of"New City" to be over 40 Li’s in light of the author’s research on the land coverage of"New City",thus presenting a bold challenge on the relevant classical historical data in Memoir during Ruling of Founder of Ming DynastyPart Five-"Consolidation and Modification of ’New City’".By fully utilizing the fundamental research results on "New City’",this part approaches from the perspective of "New City" construction and inquires into the process starting from the consolidation of Nanjing City to the modification and finally to the formation of Capital City,and thus sequentially connects the two historical phases of "New City"and Capital CityPart Six-"Study on the Relations between‘New City’and Capital City".This part addresses the relations between "New City" and Capital City and based on that,denies the opinion of equating these two cities,points out the succession relations between the two and carries out comparative studies in terms of city nature,construction background and construction personnel.Part Seven-"Other Issues in relation to ’New City’".This part explores the four issues,i.e.office gate of the commanding officer,inner walls,"Quasi Outer Walls"and length of Capital City.These four issues have not been specified in the previous parts but are closely related to "New City".After such exploration,this part holds that the office gate of the commanding officer is the north wall gate of "New City" at the Drum Tower of Nanjing,which not only solves the mystery of nature,location and disappearance of the office gate,but also provides a solid proof for the existence of the north wall.The research on inner walls gives for the first time a complete review on the findings in prior literature and,based on the accurate materials extracted from these findings,inquires preliminarily into general information of inner walls and their relations to "New City".The term "Quasi Outer Walls" is invented by this thesis with the aim to expand the scope of research on outer walls of "New City" in the spirit of respecting historical facts.The exact length of Capital City has long been the unsolved mystery in the academic field.As Capital City is closely related to "New City",the length of Capital City would not be known without appropriate interpretation on the construction process and length of "New City".By taking advantage of a series of results on "New City" researches and through careful textual criticism,this thesis put forward for the first time the opinion that the length of Capital City is 33.547 kilometers,hoping to attract more interactive researches between "New City" and Capital City in the future.The "Conclusion" part of this thesis is presented subsequent to the above seven main parts.It summarizes this thesis from four perspectives,namely the new interpretation of "Redundant Wall",fundamental research,framework of the thesis and explorations in specific topics and,in reviewing the research of this thesis and indicating its deficiencies,holds that the future research on "New City" should expand its scope from the city wall to all aspects of city construction,aiming "the history of ’New City’" as the research subject so as to make contributions to the research on the city history of Nanjing.