Capital of Kingdom of Cao Wei, Hou Zhou, and other kingdoms

Location: Linzhang County, Hebei Province

Period: 204- 580

Excavated from 1983 to the present

Significance: It has provided precious material objects for the study of the economic, cultural, military, religious, and technological developments of the city.

 Introduction 

Tile-end with 4 characters, meaning "long live Great Zhao": piece of building (mid, diameter 15 cm); Tile-end with 4 characters, meaning "wealth, honor and long life": piece of building (bottom, diameter 14.5 cm); Stone head of chi (a footless dragon): piece of building (up, length 1.92 m)

Situated on the banks of the Zhanghe River and 18 kilometers to the north of Anyang City at present, the Yecheng City Site is one important of ancient capitals. After the extinction of the Shang Dynasty in the 11th century B.C., this place rose again 1,500 years ago and became the political, economic and cultural center of China.

From the last years of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the city experienced the period of the 16 States of the Western Jin and Eastern Jin dynasties and the Northern and Southern dynasties, and there were 6 dynasties as the Cao Wei, the Later Zhao, the Ran Wei, the Former Yan, the Eastern Wei and the Northern Qi established their capitals here, which lasted 126 years. In 580, Yecheng was destroyed and moved south to Anyang City, so Anyang was also called Ye.

Yecheng City was first built in the Spring and Autumn Period (770-476BC). The North Yecheng was built in the Cao Wei Dynasty, 3.5 kilometers from east to west and 2.5 kilometers from north to south with 7 gates for the outer city wall and 4 gates for the inner. The South Yecheng was built by the Eastern Wei. A lot of luxurious buildings like Taiji Palace, Zhaoyang Palace, Xiandu Garden and so on were increased.

Unfortunately, at present, a lot of precious relics in the Yecheng City Site have disappeared.