Qingyang County 青阳县

Setting and landscape

The county sits on the south bank of the middle and lower Yangtze, in the northern part of the southern Anhui mountains. Its rivers, among them the Qingtong (青通河), the Jiuhua (九华河) and the Qixing (七星河), run through the whole county, and the county government puts forest cover at 57.6 per cent.

History

A county seat was placed at Lingyang (陵阳) as early as 109 BC, when Mount Jiuhua was still called Lingyang Mountain. The present county was formed in 742, in the Tianbao era of the Tang, from parts of Nanling (南陵), Qiupu (秋浦) and Jing (泾) counties, and took its name from lying on the south side of Qingshan (青山). Its seat is Rongcheng (蓉城镇).

Qingyang opera (青阳腔), praised as an ancestor of Peking opera, was on the first national intangible heritage list, and Mulian plays (目连戏), Nuo drama (傩戏) and Jiuhua folk songs are widely sung. The county counts more than 400 old sites, tombs, buildings and inscriptions, among them the tomb of Teng Zijing (滕子京墓), Taiping Shanfang (太平山房) and the Li clan ancestral hall (李氏宗祠).

What to see

Lingyang, in the south of the county among Huangshan, Mount Jiuhua and Taiping Lake (太平湖), is a national historic and cultural town. The poet Qu Yuan (屈原) is said to have stayed there for nine years and names it in his poem "Ai Ying" (哀郢). Its old street keeps smithies, vermicelli workshops, vinegar shops and inns behind Huizhou-style gabled walls, and the three-arched stone Nanliu Bridge (南流桥), first built in the Song and rebuilt many times, is 45 metres long. The town area also takes in Jiuhua Shenlong Gorge (九华神龙谷), a national 4A scenic area since 2019, and an old pilgrim path to Mount Jiuhua.

Food and local products

Jiuhua huangjing (九华黄精, Solomon's seal root) is grown on more than 50,000 mu and is a national geographical-indication product; it is also candied. Huangshixi Maofeng tea (黄石溪毛峰) from Lingyang won a gold medal at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition, and Lingyang's tofu products, wild bamboo shoots and sweet-potato vermicelli sell well within and beyond Anhui.

Getting oriented

The county town is 20 kilometres from Jiuhuashan Airport, and Jiuhuashan high-speed station is 4 kilometres from it in a straight line. The Yangtze riverside expressway and National Highway 318 cross the county from east to west, and the Beijing–Taipei expressway and National Highway 330 from north to south.

Highlights

• Mount Jiuhua 九华山: One of China's four Buddhist mountains, the seat of Ksitigarbha, within the county.
• Lingyang Old Street 陵阳老街: Huizhou-style street with the Song-founded, three-arched Nanliu Bridge.
• Qingyang opera 青阳腔: Local opera praised as an ancestor of Peking opera; on the first national intangible heritage list.
• Jiuhua huangjing 九华黄精: Solomon's seal root, a national geographical-indication product.