Niangzi Pass also called the Ladies' Pass, is a mountain pass

Mountain pass

A mountain pass is a route through a mountain range or over a ridge. If following the lowest possible route, a pass is locally the highest point on that route...

 west of Shijiazhuang

Shijiazhuang

Shijiazhuang is the capital and largest city of North China's Hebei province. Administratively a prefecture-level city, it is about south of Beijing...

, capital of Hebei

Hebei

' is a province of the People's Republic of China in the North China region. Its one-character abbreviation is "" , named after Ji Province, a Han Dynasty province that included what is now southern Hebei...

 Province in North China

North China

thumb|250px|Northern [[People's Republic of China]] region.Northern China or North China is a geographical region of China. The heartland of North China is the North China Plain....

. One of the major passages from Shanxi

Shanxi

' is a province in Northern China. Its one-character abbreviation is "晋" , after the state of Jin that existed here during the Spring and Autumn Period....

 Province to Hebei Province across the Taihang Mountains

Taihang Mountains

The Taihang Mountains are a Chinese mountain range running down the eastern edge of the Loess Plateau in Henan, Shanxi and Hebei provinces. The range extends over 400 km from north to south and has an average elevation of 1,500 to 2,000 meters. The principal peak is Xiao Wutaishan...

, it is 55 kilometres (34.2 mi) west of Shijiazhuang, at the point where the Shitai Railway

Shitai Railway

Shijiazhuang-Taiyuan Railway or Shitai Railway is a railway between Shijiazhuang and Taiyuan, the provincial capitals, respectively, of Hebei and Shanxi Province in northern China. The line is in length and was built from 1903 to 1907....

 (Shijiazhuang--Taiyuan

Taiyuan

Taiyuan is the capital and largest city of Shanxi province in North China. At the 2010 census, it had a total population of 4,201,591 inhabitants on 6959 km² whom 3,212,500 are urban on 1,460 km². The name of the city literally means "Great Plains", referring to the location where the Fen River...

, capital of Shanxi) crosses the border between the two provinces on its way to Taiyuan.

Surrounded by a maze of hills and valleys, Niangziguan Pass was famed as "the Ninth Pass on the Great wall". The extant pass was built in 1542 during the Ming Dynasty

Ming Dynasty

The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...

. The pass is flanked by hills more than l,000 metres high. A river, the Tao River

Tao River

Tao River is a right tributary of China's Yellow River. It starts in Xiqing Mountains near the Gansu-Qinghai border, flows eastward across Gannan Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, and then northward more or less along the border between Dingxi Prefecture-level City in the east and Gannan and Linxia...

, twists its way through the valleys below. In ancient times this provided a narrow passage for men and horses.

Legend goes that during the Tang Dynasty

Tang Dynasty

The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...

, the army under the command of Princess Pingyang, daughter of Li Yuan, the first emperor of the Tang Dynasty, once garrisoned here. Hence the name "Ladies Pass."

Its defence played an important part in the Battle of Xinkou

Battle of Xinkou

The Battle of Xinkou was the second of the 22 major engagements between the National Revolutionary Army and Imperial Japanese Army during the Second Sino-Japanese War.-Prelude:...

between the Chinese Nationalists and the Japanese.