Tuocheng Ancient Town 佗城

About Tuocheng Ancient Town

Tuocheng Ancient Town (佗城), also called Zhao Tuo's Old City (赵佗故城), is the historic seat of Longchuan County (龙川县) in Heyuan (河源), Guangdong, and lies in the south of the county. It is described as Guangdong's earliest county seat.

After Qin Shi Huang's armies subdued the Nanyue (南越) lands, Zhao Tuo (赵佗), Longchuan's first magistrate, built a walled seat here in 214 BC, and the town takes its name from him. The county government calls Longchuan the place where Zhao Tuo, later king of Nanyue, rose to power, and one of the four oldest counties in Guangdong. The town stayed the political, economic and cultural hub of the county until 1949. Tuocheng was in Guangdong's first batch of historic and cultural cities, and in 2009 a United Nations group of place-name experts recognised Longchuan as a "thousand-year-old county".

The Longchuan Confucian School (龙川学宫), a provincial protected site, was founded in the Tang dynasty and repaired many times since; the county government counts it among the earliest-founded school-temples in the Lingnan (岭南) region, with more of its original buildings than most. Zhengxiang Pagoda (正相塔) is a six-sided, seven-storey brick pagoda first built in 715 as Kaiyuan Pagoda (开元塔) and rebuilt in the Song. It was renamed after the demoted chancellor Wu Qian (吴潜) lived at its foot in 1259, and it went on Guangdong's first list of provincial protected sites in 1962. A 1959 repair raised it to 32.2 m. Because the town has a second, Ming-dynasty brick pagoda, it is also known as the Old Pagoda (老塔).

On Zhongshan Street, the Yuewang Well (越王井) and the Qing-dynasty Nanyue King Temple (南越王庙), which houses a statue of Zhao Tuo, were listed together as a provincial protected site in 2015. The well, over two thousand years old, still holds clear water; stretches of the old city wall run between the old town and the fields; and the Song-dynasty Su Dike (苏堤) can be made out across farmland, reaching toward the hills. The sites of the county yamen and of Zhao Tuo's residence also lie inside the town. Since 2010 the county has restored a series of protected sites, among them the Yuewang Well, Zhengxiang Pagoda, the Confucian school and the Nanyue King Temple.

What to look for

• Longchuan Confucian School (龙川学宫), founded in the Tang dynasty, a Guangdong provincial protected site
• Zhengxiang Pagoda (正相塔), a six-sided, seven-storey brick pagoda first built in 715
• Yuewang Well (越王井), more than two thousand years old and still holding clear water
• Nanyue King Temple (南越王庙), a Qing-dynasty temple with a statue of Zhao Tuo
• Remains of the old city wall between the old town and the fields
• Sites of the county yamen (县衙署遗址) and Zhao Tuo's former residence (赵佗故居)

Location & getting there

Getting to Tuocheng Ancient Town

• Search for 佗城 with 河源市 and 龙川县.