Site of Gucheng Ancient City

Site of Gucheng Ancient City

The Site of Gucheng Ancient City is a cultural heritage site protected at the provincial level in Jiangsu Province.

Gucheng, also known as Pingling City and commonly referred to as "Chuwang City", is located 10 kilometers east of Gaochun County, with Gucheng Lake to its northwest and Xuxi River to its west.

The site is divided into inner and outer sections, both constructed with rammed earth and wooden planks. The outer city, also called Luocheng, has a roughly rectangular layout, approximately 800 meters long from north to south and 1000 meters wide from east to west, with a perimeter of 3915 meters. Its northern wall is relatively well-preserved, with a base width of 41 meters and remaining height of 2–6 meters. There are original gate openings on the eastern, western, and northern sides. Originally, there was a moat surrounding the outer city, about 18 meters wide, which has now dried up and been turned into farmland. The inner city, also called Zicheng, is located slightly west of the center of Luocheng. It also has a rectangular shape, measuring 121 meters long and 196 meters wide from east to west. The terrain is higher in the north and lower in the south, originally standing 4 meters higher than the ground level of the outer city. It also had a surrounding moat about 13.5 meters wide, which has since silted up.

Artifacts unearthed within the city include bronze tripods and bianzhong bells from the Spring and Autumn Period, ying'ai coins, Han Dynasty roof tiles, and Han bricks from the Warring States Period. To the southeast and south of the city, tomb clusters from the Western and Eastern Han Dynasties have been discovered. On the western side of the city, along the shores of Gucheng Lake, the Eastern Han Dynasty “Jiaoguan Stele” has been found.

The periods of the unearthed artifacts from both inside and outside the city generally align with historical records that identify Gucheng as the Wu state’s Lüzhu settlement during the Spring and Autumn Period and as the seat of Liyang County during the Qin and Han Dynasties.

Gucheng Subdistrict: A town under the jurisdiction of Gaochun County. Established as the Gucheng District in 1949, renamed Gucheng Township in 1957, changed to a commune in 1958, reinstated as a township in 1983, and upgraded to a town in 1989. Located on the eastern shore of Gucheng Lake, it borders Xuancheng City of Anhui Province to the south and is 15 kilometers from the county seat. Covering an area of 62.2 square kilometers with a population of 28,000, it is bordered by Gucheng Lake to the west, traversed by the Xuxi River in the middle, and connected to Nanjing via the Shuanggu Highway to the north of the town, offering convenient transportation. The subdistrict administers the following villages: Jiangshan, Huashan, Tianjia, Meichang, Qiaotou, Shuguang, Gucheng, Tangkeng, Qiangwu, Shuanggang, Shuangquan, Tan Village, Shuangjin, Wuxing, Youshan, Anzhong, Luxi, Tianbao... More detailed information about Gucheng Subdistrict ++

Further Reading:

· Fourth Batch of Jiangsu Provincial Cultural Heritage Protection Units

· Seventh Batch of National Key Cultural Heritage Protection Units