Yanmenguan
Encyclopedia
Yanmenguan also known as Xixingguan is the name of a Great Wall 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...

. Located in Dai County
Dai County
Dai County is under the administrative control of Xinzhou City, Shanxi. Also known as Daizhou in ancient texts.-References:*Romance of the Three Kingdoms/Chapter 2...

, Xinzhou
Xinzhou
Xinzhou is a prefecture-level city of the People's Republic of China province of Shanxi.-Administrative Divisions:- Education :Xinzhou has numerous public schools, including Xin Zhou Yi Zhong Xue , which is considered the most prestigious of public high schools in the region.Another public high...

 of 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 in China
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...

. The current Yanmenguan reconstruction was built during 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...

 and currently known as one of the announced monuments of China.

Name

Yanmenguan is situated on Yanmen Mountain. The east side and the west side of the mountain
Mountain
Image:Himalaya_annotated.jpg|thumb|right|The Himalayan mountain range with Mount Everestrect 58 14 160 49 Chomo Lonzorect 200 28 335 52 Makalurect 378 24 566 45 Mount Everestrect 188 581 920 656 Tibetan Plateaurect 250 406 340 427 Rong River...

 face each other, and hence the whole mountain looks like a huge door. Yanmen Mountain was named for its door-alike shape, in which "Yanmen" means doors in Chinese
Chinese language
The Chinese language is a language or language family consisting of varieties which are mutually intelligible to varying degrees. Originally the indigenous languages spoken by the Han Chinese in China, it forms one of the branches of Sino-Tibetan family of languages...

.

History

The first pass was built by the King Wuling of Zhao
King Wuling of Zhao
King Wuling of Zhao reigned in the State of Zhao during the Warring States Period of Chinese history...

 during the Warring States Period
Warring States Period
The Warring States Period , also known as the Era of Warring States, or the Warring Kingdoms period, covers the Iron Age period from about 475 BC to the reunification of China under the Qin Dynasty in 221 BC...

, for defense against the Inner Asian nomads. It eventually became ruined during Yuan Dynasty
Yuan Dynasty
The Yuan Dynasty , or Great Yuan Empire was a ruling dynasty founded by the Mongol leader Kublai Khan, who ruled most of present-day China, all of modern Mongolia and its surrounding areas, lasting officially from 1271 to 1368. It is considered both as a division of the Mongol Empire and as an...

 because of the lack of repairing over a long period of time. The pass was then reconstructed in 1374.
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