Frontier town · Great Xia, the Tangut empire · as at first light, 1 January 1200

Xining

The walled town where the Huangshui valley opens to the plateau.

Under the Tibetan kingdom it was Qingtang, Gusiluo's capital from 1032 and a rich trading city on the road to Khotan and the Hexi (Wikipedia, Tsongkha); the Song took it in 1103-1105 and named it Xining, 'peace in the west', in 1104 (Wikipedia, Xining). The Xia hold it from 1136. In 1200 it is a Tangut garrison town and market in a Tibetan country: the prefect holds the walls and the road, and the Tibetan tribes of the lake and the side valleys come in to sell horses, wool and salt and to buy tea, grain and cloth.

Of the town's buildings only the Han-era and Tibetan layers are known; Kumbum (late 16th century), the great mosque (a Ming work) and the Beishan temple (undated) are not documented for 1200.

Who holds it

Title
Prefect (zhizhou) of Xiningzhou, with the garrison commander, for the Xia
Since
not known
Born
not known
Family
not known
Confidence
low

No holder named in any source reached; the Xia law code and Chinese Wikipedia were not reachable.

Lord in 1200

The Xia prefect of Xiningzhou, name not known (see Xining (Xia)).

What the town holds

  • The walls, market and tolls of Xining
  • The lower Huangshui and its side valleys round the town
  • The roads: east to Ledu, west over the Riyue pass to the lake, north to Zhuoluo and Liangzhou

How it was acquired

By 1136 (gift or conquest: see Xining (Xia)). Qingtang of the Tibetan kings 1032-1103; Song Xining from 1104.

Allies and rivals

The Jin garrisons across the Yellow River at Lanzhou and Hezhou (peace); the Tibetan tribes of the lake; Lezhou downstream.

How things stand that morning

Held by Xia in peace; no revolt or garrison change known for the winter of 1199-1200 (an absence of evidence).

Wealth

Tolls and the horse trade; the town sits where the lake road, the Hexi road and the Yellow River road meet.

Military

No numbers survive for 1200.

Threats

  • A Tibetan tribal quarrel on the lake side (nothing dated)
  • Jin pressure over the Yellow River crossings (nothing dated for 1199-1200)

Charter

none known (a Xia prefecture)

Council

The prefect and garrison commander; no town council is documented. Tibetan chiefs have no seat in it.

Communities

Tangut officials and garrison; Han townspeople; Tibetan traders and lamas; merchants of the Hexi. No community is documented for 1200.

Fairs and markets

Horse and wool fairs on the Tibetan pattern (general); the licensed Jin-Xia border markets of Wikipedia's Western Xia lie on the Yellow River and the Ordos edge, not at Xining.

Militia

A Tangut garrison with local call-up (general Xia pattern). No numbers survive for 1200.

Walls and castle

A walled town on the old Qingtang site; no description survives in our sources.

Trade and crafts

Tibetan ponies and mules, wool, hides, musk, herbs and Chaka salt come in; tea, cloth, grain and iron go out (general pattern; the Qingtang-era Khotan road is recalled, not read).

What the year holds

What happened next, if nothing in play changes it. Each event carries what it depends on and what would stop it.

  1. 1209 to 1227The Mongol invasions of the Hexi (autumn 1209) and the Xia's submission (1210), and the Mongol conquest of the Xia in 1226-1227 (Timeline of the Tanguts).Depends on: Temujin's rise; not yet Chinggis Khan until 1206. Stopped by: A Mongol defeat on the steppe.
  2. by 1240The Mongols hold eastern Amdo (Wikipedia, Amdo).Depends on: The fall of Xia and Jin. Stopped by: A Mongol failure in the west.

Places of note

  • Xining: The walled town.

Where the sources disagree

  • The assignment names the town 'Xiping fu'; the prefecture table in Wikipedia's Western Xia names it Xiningzhou, and we use that. 'Xiping fu' is not confirmed by anything we could read (zh.wikipedia refused).
  • The campaign board entry xining-xia: 'given to the Tanguts by the Jin in 1136'. Wikipedia's Timeline of the Tanguts says conquest; see Xining (Xia).

Evidence: The Qingtang-Song-Xia sequence is in Wikipedia's Tsongkha, Xining and Western Xia pages; the town's 1200 life is not documented.

"The campaign board" is OMNIA's working map. These notes record where its earlier claims were checked against the sources.

On the map: The near land is a guess at the irrigated valley round the town.

Primary sources for Great Xia

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
  • 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 Song, the chapters on Xia and on foreign states, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1345). The Song court's accounts of its neighbours, each arranged as an annal of embassies and wars. Read online
  • Compendium of Chronicles: the Turkic and Mongol tribes and the life of Chinggis Khan, Rashid al-Din Hamadani (about 1300 to 1311, in the Ilkhanate). The fullest description of who held what on the steppe around 1200, written a century later from Mongol court records (the Altan Debter) and from informants such as Bolad Chingsang. 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
  • History of the Song, Toqto'a (脫脫) and the Yuan history office (1343 to 1345, from the Song veritable records, state histories and the Huiyao). The official history of the Southern Song, which ruled from Lin'an (Hangzhou) in 1200. Read online

5 more in the sources library for The Tarim, the Uyghurs and Xia.

Sources and studies

  1. Wikipedia, Tsongkha (cites Twitchett 1994, Smith 2006, Tuttle 2013; read this session)
  2. Wikipedia, Xining (read this session)
  3. Wikipedia, Western Xia (prefecture table, wars, border markets; read this session)
  4. Wikipedia, Timeline of the Tanguts (read this session)

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