Yangjumie

Who holds it

Title

Governor of the town for its lord

Since

not known

Born

not known

Confidence

low

Lord in 1200

Duan Zhixing at his palace; the Gao chancellor's house beside it; the Azhali clergy and the royal temples of Chongsheng

How things stand that morning

The court of an old king and a Gao chancellor; no event dated.

Charter

none known; the king's seat

Council

The chancellor and the ministers of the court; the offices are the Nanzhao ones kept (the Chinese Wikipedia names the chancellors' ranks as tanchuo, buxie, jiuzan and yanzan, and nine ministries beneath them: that list is Nanzhao's, and we do not know how far Dali kept it).

Communities

Bai families, Azhali priests, Yi from the hills, and caravan merchants from Burma and Tibet.

Fairs and markets

Tradition puts the Third Month fair at the foot of the Cangshan from the Nanzhao and Dali age; we did not check it.

Militia

levies of the fu; no figure

Walls and castle

Walled citadel and royal quarter on the Nanzhao plan; the long wall closing the plain from the Cangshan to the lake at both passes. Taihe on the south is a ruin.

Trade and crafts

Salt, tea and horses on the great road from Burma and Tibet to Shanchan and the Song; cloth, marble from the Cangshan (the later 'Dali stone'), bronze and gilding for the temples.

Places of note

• Chongsheng Three Pagodas: The Three Pagodas of Chongsheng.
• Taihe village (Taihe city): Taihe, the old capital, a ruin.

Where the sources disagree

• Board 'dali-yangjumie' puts Yangjumie at 25.606 N 100.267 E, which is Xiaguan at the south pass. The Nanzhao and Dali city lay under the Cangshan near the Old Town; we place it at 25.69 N 100.16 E, about.

Evidence: Capital status from Wikipedia and the lists; the location is the Dali Old Town area, not pinned to the ruin.

Primary sources for Dali

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.

• The Complete Annals of Dai Viet, Ngo Si Lien, drawing on Le Van Huu's Dai Viet su ky (1272) and Phan Phu Tien; continued by Pham Cong Tru and Le Hi (1479; printed 1697 in the standard Chinh Hoa edition). The main narrative source for Dai Viet in 1200, compiled in 1479 from Le Van Huu's lost history of 1272. Read online
• History of Song, chapters 488 and 489: Jiaozhi, Dali, Champa, Zhenla, Pagan, Srivijaya, Java, Brunei, Chola and Tambralinga, Toqto'a (Tuotuo) and the Yuan history office, from the Song court records (1343 to 1345, from Song veritable records and court diaries). The Chinese court's record of its southern neighbours, compiled from Song archives. Read online
• The Unofficial History of Nanzhao, Yang Shen; revised by Hu Wei (16th century, revised 1775, from Dali and Yunnan traditions and lost local histories). The kingdom of Dali has no surviving text of 1200: its own records were destroyed in the Mongol conquest and after, and the Song shi's Dali entry ends in 1175. 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
• Draft Compilation of the Collected Statutes of the Song, Various; the Song huiyao were compiled by the Song state, the surviving draft reassembled by Xu Song from the Yongle dadian in the nineteenth century (the original Song compilations date from the eleventh to the thirteenth century; the surviving extracts were recovered in 1809 to 1820 and printed in 1936). Dated extracts from the Song government's own statute collections, arranged by office. Read online
• Notes in Answer to Questions about the Lands beyond the Passes, Zhou Qufei (周去非) (1178, after service in Guangxi). A Guangxi official's notes, written twenty years before 1200, on the south-western frontier of the Song and the countries beyond. Read online