Horse Market Street

　　Horse Market Street got its name because during the late Tang Dynasty, the self-proclaimed warlord Lu Guangchou grazed his horses here. Historically, it has been known by various names such as Mazhi Alley, Horse Market, -, and Horse Road. Due to phonetic similarities, it was long mispronounced as Maqi Alley or Maci Alley. During the Song and Ming dynasties, Horse Market Street was still a dilapidated road, and it wasn’t until the Qing Dynasty that it was upgraded to a proper street as pedestrian traffic gradually increased.

　　In the late Tang Dynasty, Horse Market Street served as a military campsite after Lu Guangchou built Baisheng Gate. Normally, the army’s warhorses were pastured in the open area around Horse Market. No more precise historical evidence is available, leaving room for speculation: could it be that later merchants, aware of the area’s history with horse grazing, turned it into a hub for livestock such as mules, horses, and donkeys, thus giving rise to the name “Horse Market”? If true, this would be an example of a military function evolving into a commercial outcome.

　　The exact time when the name “Horse Market Street” disappeared is unclear. According to elders, the name was still in use in the 1940s. Fortunately, today’s Houde Road has transformed this long-defunct street name, infusing it with richer cultural significance. In fact, not only was there no longer a need for a Horse Market, but even horses themselves were consciously returned from domestic herding to the wild by the end of the last century, lest their species face extinction — let alone their former glory on the battlefield. Modern military competition has long since evolved from the primitive forms of horses and chariots to the electronic information age.

　　Back then, Horse Market Street, being connected to Baisheng Gate, was considered an important route. Though it linked the hustle and bustle stretching from Wudao Temple, Confucius Temple, Guangxiao Temple, and Jiangdong Temple, in the memories of old Ganzhou residents, Horse Market Street was always desolate and remote. Walking west along Horse Market Street, to the right lies the low-lying Lotus Pond. Ganzhou locals love eating poached eggs — did the pond get its name because it resembled the shape of a poached egg? Another theory suggests that Lotus Pond earned its name because it was densely covered year-round with lotus flowers, leaves, or stems.

　　Approaching the entrance of Xiaonanmen from Horse Market Street, you’ll suddenly see the lush, elevated Dongsheng Mountain to the left. Described by Qing Dynasty poet Song Luo, Dongsheng Mountain was a remote, layered hill where “a path from the corner of the city leads into the hazy distance, with flower gates and bamboo groves hiding the rolling hills,” a place of strange beauty where even after the social festivals ended, peach and pomegranate blossoms might still bloom in the cold of December. Today, Dongsheng Mountain has become a gentle, wide avenue — about as broad as Horse Market Street, which has itself expanded several times — and the layered hills and small corners described by poets of old have long vanished. To the right at the junction of Horse Market Street and Nanshi Street lie Ganzhou’s Gujia Ridge and Cigu Ridge, with the legendary Night Light Mountain (said to hide a luminous pearl) further in the distance. To the left front is the Brush Peak Mountain, symbolizing Ganzhou’s cultural flourishing. With Dongsheng Mountain and Night Light Mountain flanking north and south, Gujia Ridge and Cigu Ridge accompanying on the sides, and Brush Peak Mountain standing afar, five of the area’s “three mountains and five ridges” align along Horse Market Street — such a concentration of hills surely indicates what a remote place this once was.

　　Interestingly, what was once remote has now become a thoroughfare. Dongsheng Mountain has evolved from the former “path at the corner of the city” into one of the main streets connecting the East River Bridge and the eastern urban corridor. In the past, cities were closed and self-contained, so Baisheng Gate stood rather proudly at the entrance of Horse Market Street. Now, the city is open and outward-looking, and the major road that once wound its way from the foot of Baisheng Gate cuts through the flattened Cigu Ridge, Gujia Ridge, and Dongsheng Mountain, carrying the modern vibrancy of the city onward, beyond the East River Bridge, to a more exciting world outside.

　　Horse Market Street: This street is located beside the main gate of the former Jinan Confucian Temple (i.e., the Temple of Confucius). Before the Xinhai Revolution, out of reverence for Confucius, it was required that “civil officials dismount and military officials get off their horses” when passing by the temple gate. As a result, visitors or those coming to worship Confucius would tether their horses here, hence the name Horse Market Street.