Keyuan (), located at
Boxia (),
Guancheng District, West
Dongguan
Dongguan,; pinyin: alternately romanized via Cantonese as Tungkun, is a prefecture-level city in central Guangdong Province, China. An important industrial city in the Pearl River Delta, Dongguan borders the provincial capital of Guangzhou t ...
city, is one of the Four Great Gardens of
Guangdong
) means "wide" or "vast", and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. The name "''Guang''" ultimately came from Guangxin ( zh, labels=no, first=t, t= , s=广信), an outpost established in Han dynasty ...
in China. Ke Yuan represents the
Lingnan
Lingnan (; ) is a geographic area referring to the lands in the south of the Nanling Mountains. The region covers the modern China, Chinese subdivisions of Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Hong Kong & Macau and Northern Vietnam.
Background
The ar ...
garden architecture.
Keyuan was built during the
Qing Dynasty
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing, was a Manchu-led Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China and an early modern empire in East Asia. The last imperial dynasty in Chinese history, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the ...
by Zhang Jingxiu.
Construction was completed in 1850.
After that, Keyuan has been expanded and reconstructed a few times.
Zhang Jingxiu was first and second assigned as Anchashi () of the
Guangxi
Guangxi,; officially the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of the China, People's Republic of China, located in South China and bordering Vietnam (Hà Giang Province, Hà Giang, Cao Bằn ...
and
Jiangxi
; Gan: )
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provinces by a Qing dynasty emperor. (A Qing officer rank which corresponds to a vice governor nowadays.) After he retired and returned to his home town Dongguan he lived in Keyuan.
Zhang was good at and fond of Chinese writing, painting, chess, poetry, antiquing, stone collecting, etc. He invited friends, poets, scholars and painters to gather in Keyuan. And that's how Keyuan became one of the origins of Guangdong culture.
Compared with the other three gardens, the significance of Ke Yuan is far beyond just being a private own garden. Keyuan could be considered the origin of
Lingnan culture
Cantonese culture, or Lingnan culture, refers to the regional Chinese culture of the region of Lingnan: twin provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi, the names of which mean "eastern expanse" and "western expanse", respectively.
With the migration ...
, for example, the famous
lingnan
Lingnan (; ) is a geographic area referring to the lands in the south of the Nanling Mountains. The region covers the modern China, Chinese subdivisions of Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan, Hong Kong & Macau and Northern Vietnam.
Background
The ar ...
style painting (a major branch of Chinese painting) was originated in Keyuan.
Image gallery
Image:Keyuan.jpg, Dongguan Keyuan
Image:Keyuan6.jpg, Dongguan Keyuan
Image:Ky-bridge.jpg, Dongguan Keyuan
Image:Ky1.gif, Dongguan Keyuan
Image:Ky2.jpg, Dongguan Keyuan
Image:Ke Yuan-Viewfromhome.jpg, A view of Keyuan
See also
*
List of Chinese gardens
This is a list of Chinese garden, Chinese-style gardens both within China and elsewhere in the world.
Greater China
This list is organized by region within the Greater China region, roughly following the structure laid out by Maggie Keswick in '' ...
References
Gardens in Guangdong
Tourist attractions in Dongguan
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