Hengchun Old Town
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Hengchun Old City Wall () refers to the historic castle town of
Hengchun, Pingtung Hengchun is a Township (Taiwan), township located on the southern tip of the Hengchun Peninsula in Pingtung County, Taiwan. It is the southernmost township in Taiwan. Hengchun is also the only urban township in the southern part of Pingtung Coun ...
,
Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
. The town is known for its well-preserved
city walls A defensive wall is a fortification usually used to protect a city, town or other settlement from potential aggressors. The walls can range from simple palisades or earthworks to extensive military fortifications such as curtain walls with to ...
that surround the city, and is the only castle town in Taiwan where all of the original gates remain standing. It is protected as a national historical site.


History

During the Qing dynasty, the area that is modern-day Hengchun was governed as part of Fengshan County. However, being a distant and sparsely populated region, the Qing found it hard to govern the area. Things took a turn following the ''Rover'' incident and the
Mudan incident The Japanese punitive expedition to Taiwan in 1874, referred to in Japan as the and in Taiwan and mainland China as the Mudan incident (), was a punitive expedition launched by the Japanese ostensibly in retaliation for the murder of 54 Ryū ...
, causing the Qing government to decide to maintain a stronger presence in the area. Shen Baozhen, originally dispatched to Hengchun after the Mudan incident, suggested that a fort be built in the area and named it "Hengchun", meaning "constantly spring", referring to the region's fair weather. Construction ran between 1875 and 1879 and was designed by Liu Ao, who would later design the Walls of Taipei. When completed, Hengchun became the seat of the newly-founded Hengchun County. Since its founding, the fort was damaged multiple times. An
typhoon A typhoon is a tropical cyclone that develops between 180° and 100°E in the Northern Hemisphere and which produces sustained hurricane-force winds of at least . This region is referred to as the Northwestern Pacific Basin, accounting for a ...
in 1908 caused severe damage to the wooden gatehouses, and large parts of the walls were further damaged during World War Two and the 1959 Hengchun earthquake. Additionally, parts of the wall were removed to construct roads, leaving only portions of the wall near the north and east gates still standing. The castle was first protected as a national historical site in 1979, and the
Tourism Bureau The Tourism Administration, MOTC () is the government agency under the Ministry of Transportation and Communications of Taiwan (Republic of China) responsible for the administration of domestic and international tourism policy making, execution ...
began repairs to the south and east gates in 1979 and 1986, respectively, including building replica gatehouses above both gates. However,
termite Termites are a group of detritivore, detritophagous Eusociality, eusocial cockroaches which consume a variety of Detritus, decaying plant material, generally in the form of wood, Plant litter, leaf litter, and Humus, soil humus. They are dist ...
s in the east gatehouse caused it to collapse again.


Structure

The original fort contained four gates, one in each cardinal direction (except the west gate, which faced northwest). Each gate featured a gatehouse and cannons. The southern gate was named the "Mingdu Gate" (明都門), while the remaining gates were left unnamed. The walls were 2.6 km long and surrounded the entire town, which was then surrounded by a
moat A moat is a deep, broad ditch dug around a castle, fortification, building, or town, historically to provide it with a preliminary line of defence. Moats can be dry or filled with water. In some places, moats evolved into more extensive water d ...
. Within the walls, civilians typically resided near the south and west gates, while a military barrack occupied the northern half of the town. Currently, while all four gates remain standing, only portions of the wall remain near the north and east gates. The south gate sits within a
roundabout A roundabout, a rotary and a traffic circle are types of circular intersection or junction in which road traffic is permitted to flow in one direction around a central island, and priority is typically given to traffic already in the junct ...
on the town's major thoroughfare.


Gallery


References

{{Coord, 22.004, N, 120.7453, E, display=title 1879 establishments in Taiwan Buildings and structures completed in 1879
Hengchun Hengchun is a Township (Taiwan), township located on the southern tip of the Hengchun Peninsula in Pingtung County, Taiwan. It is the southernmost township in Taiwan. Hengchun is also the only urban township in the southern part of Pingtung Coun ...
National monuments of Taiwan