Changsha, the capital of Hunan Province, is known as the world's "Media Art Capital", and everyone is familiar with it. But if you only look at it in the literal sense, the name "Changsha" seems a little strange, the sand is round, flat, all kinds of irregular shapes can be done, is there still a long? Why is it called Changsha? Let's talk about Changsha today.
Changsha, alias Xingcheng and Tanzhou, is located in the north-east of Hunan, the lower reaches of the Xiang River, the western edge of the Changliu Basin, east of Yichun and Pingxiang in Jiangxi Province, south of Zhuzhou and Xiangtan, west of Loudi and Yiyang, and north of Yueyang and Yiyang. Changsha is a national historical city, known as the "Hometown of Qu Jia", "Famous City of Chu and Han", and "Xiaoxiang Susi". It has an area of 11,819 square kilometers and a total permanent population of 8,394,500 (2019).
As an entertainment capital, Changsha can easily feel that it has no depth, but this is not the case. Changsha has a very long history, during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, Changsha belonged to Qianzhong County, Chu State. After the Qin Dynasty unified the world, it implemented the county system, and there were thirty-six counties in the country, with Changsha County as one and Xiang County as the county, which was the beginning of Changsha as a place name. During the Western Han Dynasty, Wu Rui (Yingbu's father-in-law) made meritorious contributions in the process of destroying Qin, and later supported Liu Bang, was made the king of Changsha, and established the state of Changsha, with the seat of governance in Linxiang County (Changsha ancient name). The famous Mawangdui Western Han Tomb was buried in the early days of the Wu dynasty of Changsha.
In the last years of the Western Han Dynasty, Wang Mang usurped the throne and established a new dynasty. Wang Mang has a big hobby, that is, he loves to change the names of various places, and Changsha is no exception. The state of Changsha was changed to Fill Man County by Wang Mang, and Linxiang County was changed to Fumu County, and I really didn't know what he was thinking all day long. As soon as Wang Mang made random changes, Liu Xiu, who had established the Eastern Han Dynasty, had to change it back with great effort. At the end of the Han Dynasty, Changsha County was subordinate to Jingzhou and was owned by the State of Wu.
After the Sui Dynasty unified the world, the prefecture county was abolished, the prefecture system was implemented, and Changsha County was changed to Tanzhou, which at that time had a large range, including changsha, Hengshan, Yiyang, and Shaoyang counties, and the prefecture was changsha county. During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, Ma Yin established the Chu State with Changsha Province as the capital, and the history was called "Ma Chu". During the Song Dynasty, the whole country was divided into fifteen roads, and Tanzhou was ruled by Jinghu South Road. In the Yuan and Ming Dynasties and the early Qing Dynasty, Changsha belonged to Huguang Province. During the Kangxi Dynasty, Huguang Province set up the Right Cloth Political Envoy Department and the Hunan Envoy Department in Changsha, which were later separated from Huguang Province into Hunan Province, and Changsha became the provincial capital. It is said that Changsha has such a long history, there should be many ancient buildings left, but this is not the case. In 1938, the Wenxi fire burned Changsha City to the ground, and the thousand-year-old city was in a mess and destroyed, which was really regrettable.
Regarding the name of Changsha, there have always been many opinions, and there are various historical records, and the more popular ones are roughly the following.
First, the astrological indications say. In ancient astronomy, there are twenty-eight astrological signs, with the stars on the top and the stars on the bottom corresponding to them, that is, the theory of astrological divisions. There is an appendix of the twenty-eight houses called "Changsha", and the following corresponds to the land of Changsha, from which Changsha gets its name. Changsha is also known as Xingsha, and Changsha people are still accustomed to calling Changsha County Xingsha. People who don't understand it also think that there are many stars in the sky of Changsha, so it is called xingsha. It is recorded in the "Records of Changsha County": "The name of Changsha ,...... There is a long star next to the yiyi, which is dividing the field in its domain, so the cloud. Han Yu also wrote a poem: "Surround Guo Qingshan with a good one, and climb high with a sleeve full of smoke." The starry sand scenery can be gazed at, and the mulberry and hemp are partial to the flowers. ”
Picture - Changsha Meixi Lake
2. It is named after the Wanlisha Temple. Ancient texts record that the Han Dynasty "had a Wanlisha Ancestral Hall, and from Xiangzhou in the west to Lai Wanli in the east, it was called Changsha." The Wanlisha Ancestral Hall was first seen in the Jin Dynasty's "Thirteen States Chronicle", which was an ancient place of worship for the god of sand and soil, and Emperor Wudi of the Han Dynasty once went to Donglai to pray for "Wanlisha". Changsha to Donglai are thousands of miles away, and people associate this matter with these two places, so there is a saying that "Changsha is the so-called Changsha of Wanli".
3. It is named after a sandbar. This sandbar is the land and water island, that is, the famous orange island head. If you look at it from the air, you will find that the orange head is a very unique slender shape, about 5 kilometers long, but about 100 meters wide. In China's rivers, sandbars are not uncommon, but ones like Orange Island are rare. The name "Changsha" may have originally come from this slender sandbar.
Picture - Overlooking Changsha Orange Island
Of course, there are other theories, as to where the name of Changsha comes from, it is difficult to figure out, it can only be the benevolent and the wise.