Han To Xianyang City Geography Research During The Period Of The Republic Of China

Xianyang is famous for the capital of the Qin dynasty in the world, and occupies an important place in the history of Chinese ancient capitals. After the Qin dynasty, Xianyang is not the capital anymore, the attention of academic circles to the Xianyang was also decreased. However as one of the important members in the metropolitan area of Chang’an (Xi’an), Xianyang has its own characteristics in the development. The Xianyang urban geography from the Han dynasty to the Republic of China was chose to study in this paper, which mainly including the changes of city sites, evolution of city form, internal spatial layout and the relationship with Xi’an. Through study, we want to summarize the law of development of Xianyang and give the suggestion to the construction of Xianyang.The whole paper including four chapters:First chapter, the historical evolution of Xianyang was described and the changes of the administrative division in historical period were analyzed briefly. The results showed that the administrative division is the product of the geopolitics. After that, the changes of Xianyang sites from the Han dynasty to the Republic of China were dicussed and the author believed that the dominant factors of the changes of Xianyang sites are weihe river shifted towards north and the changes of post roads.Second chapter, the evolution of the Xianyang city and the riverbank which located outside of the Xianyang city were introduced. The key of this chapter is in Ming and Qin dynasty because of the limited of information. The conclusion of this chapter is that the Xianyang city was soil castle structure during Ming and Qin dynasty. Besides above, the Xianyang city was built near river, so the influence of weihe river on the city was large and the structure of the city was related with the riverbank which located outside of the city.Third chapter, the development of internal spatial layout of the Xianyang city was introduced and the reason of the change was discussed. The author discussed a little which based on the limited information before Ming and Qin dynasty. The main part of this chapter is focused on the time of Ming and Qin dynasty because of the relatively rich data. The contents of this chapter are including administrative structure, educational institution, temple and offer sacrifices, commercial blocks, arrangement of streets and etc. This kind of classification of the chapter can give clear results as shown in whole chapter. The author thinks that the country and the administration which belonged to the administrative structure were located at the center of the city, Confucian temples which belonged to the educational institution were located at the west of the country and administration. Both of them were located at the center of city, however, the temple and offer sacrifices were distributed in city everywhere, and the commercial blocks was near the street. This kind of distribution is coincidence with the characteristics of city layout of China in Ming and Qin dynasty and the result of the construction patronizes of our county-cities during Ming and Qin dynasty. The whole arrangement of city is no special compared with other cities during that time. However, based on the geographic advantages as an ancient ferry, Xianyang had developed commercial activities and became a commercial center of Guanzhong area.Forth chapter, the relationship between Xianyang and Xi’an from the Han dynasty to the Republic of China was discussed. From the regional relationship aspect, the historical origin and the traffic connection between two places were described. After that, the political and economic connections between two cities at different times were discussed. The author think that the political and economic connections are the result of the regional relationship between two cities.