Xingxian 兴县

History

A county called Weifen (蔚汾县) was set up here under the Northern Qi, and after several changes of name the county has been called Xing since 1369, the second year of the Ming Hongwu reign. The Jin-Sui Border Region, a Communist base area that stretched across western Shanxi and part of Suiyuan (绥远), lasted from 1937 to 1949, and both its administrative office and its military command sat at Caijiaya. On 25 March 1948 Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai (周恩来) and Ren Bishi (任弼时) crossed the Yellow River to Caijiaya, where they delivered the speech at a conference of the region's senior cadres and the talk to the editors of the Jin-Sui Daily (晋绥日报).

What to see

The Jin-Sui Border Region Revolutionary Memorial Hall (晋绥边区革命纪念馆) is at Caijiaya, 17 li west of the county town, with Yuanbao Mountain (元宝山) to the north and the Weifen River (蔚汾河) to the south. Built in 1962, it holds about 4,300 items and looks after the former headquarters, a nationally protected site. The former residences of Mao, Zhou, Ren and He Long (贺龙) and the old military-region hall where the cadre conference met are on display.

Heicha Mountain (黑茶山), once called Hecha Mountain (合查山), rises 60 kilometres east of the county town in Donghui township (东会乡), in the north-central Lüliang Mountains (吕梁山), to a main peak of 2,203.8 metres. Its pine and cypress forest shelters brown eared pheasants, leopards and musk deer, and 'snow on Chashan' was one of Xingxian's ten traditional views. On 8 April 1946 a plane flying Wang Ruofei (王若飞), Qin Bangxian (秦邦宪), Ye Ting (叶挺) and Deng Fa (邓发) from Chongqing to Yan'an lost its way in rain, overshot Yan'an and crashed into the mountain in fog. The 'April 8' Martyrs Memorial Hall (四八烈士纪念馆) stands at Zhuangshang village (庄上村) at the foot of the mountain, and a memorial pavilion was built on the summit in 1999.

Food and local products

Cypress-seed mutton (柏籽羊肉) comes from the forest area in the county's eastern mountains, where sheep graze among cypresses and eat the seeds, which the county government says gives the meat a cypress-seed flavour.

Highlights

• Jin-Sui Border Region Revolutionary Memorial Hall 晋绥边区革命纪念馆: Former seat of the border-region government and military command at Caijiaya; memorial hall built 1962.
• Heicha Mountain 黑茶山: Forested Lüliang peak of 2,203.8 metres, site of the 8 April 1946 air crash.
• 'April 8' Martyrs Memorial Hall 四八烈士纪念馆: Memorial to Wang Ruofei, Qin Bangxian, Ye Ting, Deng Fa and others killed in the 1946 crash.
• Cypress-seed mutton 柏籽羊肉: Mutton from sheep grazed in the cypress forests of the eastern mountains.