Municipality of China
About Tianjin
Tianjin is a provincial-level direct-administered municipality in China. It is located on the shore of the Bohai Sea. It has a total population of 13,866,009 inhabitants at the 2020 census.
Name
Tianjin is the pinyin spelling of the Chinese characters 天津. The name literally means 'the ford of the emperor'. The origin of the name is disputed. One traditional theory says that it was an homage to the Chu poet Qu Yuan, whose "Li Sao" includes the verse "... departing from the Ford of Heaven at dawn ..." (朝發軔於天津兮; zhāo fārèn yú Tiānjīn xī). Another says that it honors the former name of the Girl, a Chinese constellation recorded under the name Tianjin in the Astronomical Record section of the Book of Sui. A third says that it derives from a place name noted in the River Record of the History of Jin. The most common theory says that it was bestowed by the Yongle Emperor of the Ming, who crossed Tianjin's Gu River on his way south to overthrow his nephew, the Jianwen Emperor. …
History
The land where Tianjin is now located was created in between 900 and 1300 CE by the sediments of rivers entering the sea at the Bohai Gulf, including the Yellow River, which entered the open sea in the area at one time. The construction of the Grand Canal under the Sui dynasty helped the future development of Tianjin, as the canal ran from Hangzhou to the Beijing and Tianjin region by 609 CE. Grain from southern China was regularly transported to the north through the canal and was used during the subsequent dynasties. Tianjin began to be increasingly mentioned in records during the Song dynasty and gained importance during the Yuan dynasty. Tianjin experienced development under the Yuan and became a location for the storage of goods and grains. Tianjin became a garrison town and shipping station during the Ming dynasty; it was a center of commerce by the 17th century. …
Geography
Tianjin is located on the west coast of the Bohai Gulf; the provinces of Shandong and Liaoning are located across those waters. The city is bordered by Beijing, which is 120 kilometers (75 mi) to the northwest. Tianjin is surrounded on all sides by Hebei, with the exception of its eastern border, which is the Bohai Sea. With a latitude ranging from 38° 34' to 40° 15' N and a longitude ranging from 116° 43' to 118° 04' E, the total area of the city is 11,860.63 square kilometers (4,579.41 sq mi). The city has 153 km (95 mi) of coastline and 1,137.48 kilometers (706.80 mi) of land border. It is located at the northern end of the Grand Canal of China, which connects with the Yellow and Yangtze Rivers. The municipality is generally flat and is swampy near the coast; however, it has hills in the north, where the Yan Mountains enter Tianjin. …
Content from Wikipedia, available under CC BY-SA. Read the full article →