Frontier town · The Jin empire of Zhangzong · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Linhuang fu

The Liao Supreme Capital that Abaoji founded in 918, reduced after 1120 to a garrison prefecture in the Khitan homeland.

Walls and mounds still stand; the town is mostly empty and a garrison with a market sits in the old Chinese city. It is the Jin's base on the Khitan steppe road and lies behind the boundary trench of the Linhuang line.

Who holds it

Title
Prefect and garrison commander of Linhuang
Since
not pinned
Born
not known
Confidence
low

Post certain; holder not read.

Lord in 1200

The Linhuang commander, under the Beijing liushou

How things stand that morning

A Jin garrison town in the ruined Liao Supreme Capital, thinly manned after the Khitan rising and the Tatar war; quiet on 1 January 1200 (garrison strength not known).

Council

Prefect and garrison commander.

Communities

Khitan herdsmen, some Han and Jurchen garrison families.

Militia

Garrison and Khitan jiu horse (no figures).

Walls and castle

Two linked walled cities (the northern imperial city and the southern Chinese city) of the Liao, partly ruined; Buddhist pagodas of the Liao age.

Trade and crafts

Horse and cattle trade, steppe border market.

Where the sources disagree

Evidence: Layout from archaeology (Liao Supreme Capital site); the Jin garrison's strength is not known.

Primary sources for Jin empire

Chronicles, registers, sagas and inscriptions written in or near 1200 that cover this entry. Each has its own page with editions, translations and where to read it.

  • Annals of the Western Xia, Wu Guangcheng (吳廣成) (1825 to 1827, compiled from Song, Liao, Jin and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's year-by-year reconstruction of Tangut history from the Chinese histories, since the Xia left no surviving annals of their own in Chinese. Read online
  • Continuation of the Comprehensive Mirror for Aid in Government, Bi Yuan (畢沅), completed by Feng Jiwu after his death (late eighteenth century, finished after 1801, from Song and Yuan sources). A Qing scholar's continuous month-by-month chronicle of the Song and Yuan centuries, compiled from the Song shi, the Liao, Jin and Yuan histories, Li Tao, Li Xinchuan and other Song sources. Read online
  • Essentials of the History of Goryeo, Kim Jong-seo (金宗瑞) and the Joseon history office (1452). The chronological companion to the Goryeosa, finished a year after it and drawing on the same lost records, sometimes with entries the Goryeosa omits. Read online
  • Outline and Details of Two Reigns (thirteenth century, after 1224). A Song outline-and-detail chronicle of exactly the two reigns around 1200, drawn from the court's daily records. Read online
  • Record of the Personal Campaigns of the Holy Warrior (Chinggis Khan) (presented to Khubilai in 1288, finished in Mongolian in 1290; the surviving Chinese version dates from 1369). A year-by-year Chinese account of Temujin's wars, drawn from the lost Altan Debter (the same source behind the Yuan shi's first chapter and Rashid al-Din). Read online
  • The Secret History of the Mongols (1228 or 1240 (the colophon's Year of the Rat is disputed), with later additions; the surviving Chinese transcription and gloss were made under the Ming in the 1380s). The only Mongol account of Temujin's rise, written within living memory. Read online
  • History of the Jin, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office, with Ouyang Xuan among the chief compilers (1343 to 1344, from the Jin veritable records and the Jin national history). The official history of the Jurchen empire that ruled north China and Manchuria in 1200. Read online
  • Record of the Great Jin State, Attributed to Yuwen Maozhao (宇文懋昭); the attribution is doubtful (preface dated 1234; probably assembled in the Southern Song from Song and Jin material, with later accretions). A Song-side history of the Jin, with annals for each emperor and chapters on institutions, customs, the capitals and the Jurchen way of life. Read online

14 more in the sources library for North China and Manchuria.

Sources and studies

  1. Wikipedia: Jin dynasty (1115-1234) (read this session)
  2. Article on the Khitan under the Jin dynasty, gjrwls.com (read this session)
  3. Jinshi (History of the Jin) ch. 24, Dili zhi 1 (Shangjing, Xianping, Dongjing, Beijing circuits): used from memory, the page was blocked this session and must be checked

Last revised 4 November 2026. Published 4 November 2026. Suggest a correction on the OMNIA Discord.