Fengjie is the first city at the western end of the Yangtze Three Gorges and situated at the entrance of Qutang Gorge. It is a place most cruise ships do not stop, but the cruise guides would remind cruisers whenever passing it.
This is a famous ancient town with a history of more than 2,000 years on the northern bank of the Yangtze River in the eastern part of Chongqing city. During the spring and Autumn and Warring States period (770-221 B. C.) and it was successively under the jurisdiction of several small states, including the states of Yong, Kui and Ba, which were later unified under the state of Chu. From the Qin (221-207 B. C.) and Han (206 B. C. - A. D. 220) down to the Sui Dynasty (A.D.581-618), it was administered as a county or prefecture under the names of Yufu, Yongan, Renfu, Xinzhou and Yankou. It was renamed Fengjie in the early Tang Dynasty (618-907). Because it was the seat of a prefecture, which controlled several surrounding counties, it was also named as Kuifu, or Kui Prefecture.
According to local annals, the site of Fengjie County had been moved five times from one side of the river to the other along the section of from today's Fengjie to Kui Gate. One of the sites still can be found near Baidi City at the northern bank of the river. It is the site of the ancient Fengjie which was renamed from Yufu to Yongan during the Three Kingdoms period (220-280). The county seat was moved westwards in the Song Dynasty (960-1279) to the present site, where it has remained ever since.
The city wall was built more than 500 years ago in the Ming Dynasty (1474). Built by the hills and facing the river, the city wall has a circumference of three kilometers with five city gates, each with an inscription on it. The east gate is inscribed with the words, " A natural barrier of Qutang" and the west gate, "Throat of Sichuan". The great south gate was named "Feasting the Eye", the minor south gate, "Watching the Waves", and the north gate, "Solemn and Mighty". All these inscriptions are related to the surrounding scenes. People can well imagine how spectacular the sights were in the past and how the city then looked with guards on the city wall and battle flags blotting out the sun.
At the present, however, only the great and minor south gates remain; all the others have been pulled down. The great south gate is the main thoroughfare into the city. It is also known as "Dipper Leaning Gate" from two lines of a poem by Du Fu, a great poet in the Tang Dynasty, which read, "The sun sinks beyond the solitary city of Kui, and leaning on the Dipper I direct my eyes towards the capital." Several hundred stone steps lead from the river to the Dipper Leaning Gate. From here one can feast one's eyes on the spectacular scene of "All the waters converge at Fu and Wan, Rushing to the gate at Qutang."
Fengjie is situated in a dangerous terrain rarely seen anywhere else. The Yangtze flows to the east in front of it, and the rivers Meixi and Caotang flow into the Yangtze from the north. Chijia and Baiyan are two mountains that stand on each side of the river. It is said there are "Twelve Scenes of Fengjie" on either bank of the river. They include the "Eight-Unit Formation of Zhuge Liang", "Backwater of Yanyu", "Serried Hills at Baidi", "Glorious Sunrays on Chijia", "Morning Colors on Baiyan" and "Autumn Moon over the Gorge". All these natural scenes are composed of mountains and water, sun and moon.
There is a great number of historical sites at Fengjie. In the city are the sites of the Yong'an Palace, where Liu Bei, emperor of the state of Shu in the Three Kingdoms period, entrusted his only son to his prime minister Zhuge Liang who was a legendary wise man (refer to "White Emperor City"); the Thatched Cottage Temple, where Du fu, a great poet in the Tang Dynasty, once lived in; the tomb of Madame Gan, wife of Liu Bei.
In the past, transportation was so poor that people had to carry things by shoulder or back faltering along the narrow stone paths. Fengjie has been greatly developed and it now has very good transportation and communication facilities on the river as well as over land. Ships from Fengjie go to all the ports along the river, and there are highways leading to Wushan and Enshi in Hubei Province. And the development has made it possible for the agriculture and industry to grow rapidly. Fengjie abounds in day lily, shaddock, tangerine, orange, peach and loquat. When autumn comes, the ancient city is decorated with yellow tangerines and red oranges which present a lovely picture.