Dorbod Banner or Siziwang Banner (; zh, c=四子王旗) is a

banner A banner can be a flag or another piece of cloth bearing a symbol, logo, slogan or another message. A flag whose design is the same as the shield in a coat of arms (but usually in a square or rectangular shape) is called a banner of arms. Also, ...

(

county A county () is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposesL. Brookes (ed.) '' Chambers Dictionary''. Edinburgh: Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, 2005. in some nations. The term is derived from the Old French denoti ...

equivalent) in Ulanqab,

Inner Mongolia Inner Mongolia, officially the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, is an Autonomous regions of China, autonomous region of China. Its border includes two-thirds of the length of China's China–Mongolia border, border with the country of Mongolia. ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. With population of China, a population exceeding 1.4 billion, it is the list of countries by population (United Nations), second-most populous country after ...

, bordering

Mongolia Mongolia is a landlocked country in East Asia, bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south and southeast. It covers an area of , with a population of 3.5 million, making it the world's List of countries and dependencies by po ...

Dornogovi Province Dornogovi (, ''East Gobi'') is one of the 21 aimags (provinces) of Mongolia. It is located in the southeast of the country, bordering PR China's autonomous region of Inner Mongolia. Dornogovi is located in the Gobi Desert and frequent sand- and ...

to the northwest. It is located about north of

Hohhot Hohhot,; abbreviated zh, c=呼市, p=Hūshì, labels=no formerly known as Kweisui, is the Capital (political), capital of Inner Mongolia in the North China, north of the China, People's Republic of China, serving as the region's administrativ ...

, the capital of Inner Mongolia. The banner spans , and has a population of 129,372 as of 2020. Its seat of government is located in Wulanhua.

Toponymy

The Chinese name for the banner ''siziwang'', literally "four princes", derives from the area's historic rule by four brothers. The Mongolian name for the banner ''dorbed'' means "of four".

History

The area of Dorbod Banner was ruled by four Mongol brothers, Sengge (Сэнгэ, ), Suonuobu (), Bonpo (Бумба, ) and Yi'erzhamu (), who were descendants of

Hasar Khasar (; , ), was one of the three full brothers of the legendary Genghis Khan. According to the ''Jami' al-Tawarikh'', his given name was ''Jochi'' and he got the nickname ''Khasar'' after his distinguished bravery. He was also called Khabht K ...

, a brother of

Genghis Khan Genghis Khan (born Temüjin; August 1227), also known as Chinggis Khan, was the founder and first khan (title), khan of the Mongol Empire. After spending most of his life uniting the Mongols, Mongol tribes, he launched Mongol invasions and ...

. They led their tribe in participating in the

Manchu The Manchus (; ) are a Tungusic peoples, Tungusic East Asian people, East Asian ethnic group native to Manchuria in Northeast Asia. They are an officially recognized Ethnic minorities in China, ethnic minority in China and the people from wh ...

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 ...

's conquest of Ming China in the early 17th century. In recognition of their service, the Qing court made Emubu the Duoluo Commandery Prince () in 1649 and settled their tribe in the area of modern Siziwang Banner. The title was hereditary and passed through fourteen of his descendants before the

Chinese Communist Party The Communist Party of China (CPC), also translated into English as Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Founded in 1921, the CCP emerged victorious in the ...

abolished all hereditary titles in Inner Mongolia in 1949. The last prince, Sudanamuchaogeji (), died as a private citizen in 1957. There is a sculpture of the four original princes in Wulanhua, erected in 2003.

Geography

To its east lies Sonid Right Banner, Qahar Right Rear Banner, and Qahar Right Middle Banner. To its south lies Wuchuan County and

Zhuozi County Zhuozi (; zh, s=卓资县) is a county of Ulanqab prefecture-level city, which in turn is part of Inner Mongolia, China. It has an area of , and in 2020 had about inhabitants. Administrative divisions Zhuozi County is made up of 5 towns ...

. To its west lies Darhan Muminggan United Banner. Its north is formed by a border with

. Its seat of government, the

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

of Wulanhua, is located away from

, and away from Erlianhot. The banner is located along the northern foothills of the

Yin Mountains The Yin Mountains, also known by their Chinese name as the Yin Shan or Yinshan and by various romanizations as the Daqing Mountains, are mountains in the Eastern Gobi Desert steppe of the Inner Mongolian Autonomous Region of China. The Yellow Riv ...

, and has an average elevation of . Most of the banner's area is grassland.

Climate

The banner experiences an average of to of precipitation annually. Its average annual temperature is .

Administrative divisions

Dorbod Banner is divided into 5 towns, 3 townships, and 5

sums In mathematics, summation is the addition of a sequence of numbers, called ''addends'' or ''summands''; the result is their ''sum'' or ''total''. Beside numbers, other types of values can be summed as well: functions, vectors, matrices, polynom ...

. Other: Ulan Pasture (乌兰牧场)

Demographics

As of 2009, the banner is home to 216,990 people, up from the 180,568 reported in the 2000 Census. The banner's ethnic minorities include 18,902

Mongols Mongols are an East Asian ethnic group native to Mongolia, China ( Inner Mongolia and other 11 autonomous territories), as well as the republics of Buryatia and Kalmykia in Russia. The Mongols are the principal member of the large family o ...

(8.71% of the total population), 1,086

Manchus The Manchus (; ) are a Tungusic East Asian ethnic group native to Manchuria in Northeast Asia. They are an officially recognized ethnic minority in China and the people from whom Manchuria derives its name. The Later Jin (1616–1636) an ...

(0.50%), and 837

Hui people The Hui people are an East Asian ethnoreligious group predominantly composed of Islam in China, Chinese-speaking adherents of Islam. They are distributed throughout China, mainly in the Northwest China, northwestern provinces and in the Zhongy ...

(0.39%).

Economy

Mineral deposits in the banner include

gold Gold is a chemical element; it has chemical symbol Au (from Latin ) and atomic number 79. In its pure form, it is a brightness, bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile metal. Chemically, gold is a transition metal ...

copper Copper is a chemical element; it has symbol Cu (from Latin ) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish-orang ...

nickel Nickel is a chemical element; it has symbol Ni and atomic number 28. It is a silvery-white lustrous metal with a slight golden tinge. Nickel is a hard and ductile transition metal. Pure nickel is chemically reactive, but large pieces are slo ...

manganese Manganese is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese was first isolated in the 1770s. It is a transition m ...

fluorite Fluorite (also called fluorspar) is the mineral form of calcium fluoride, CaF2. It belongs to the halide minerals. It crystallizes in isometric cubic habit, although octahedral and more complex isometric forms are not uncommon. The Mohs scal ...

gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate Hydrate, dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, drywall and blackboard or sidewalk ...

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other Chemical element, elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal i ...

, and thenardite.

Spacecraft landing site

The banner served as the landing sites for China's

Shenzhou program Shenzhou may refer to: * Shenzhou, or "Divine Land", one of the Chinese names of China * Shenzhou program, a crewed spaceflight initiative by the People's Republic of China * Shenzhou (spacecraft), spacecraft from China which first carried a Chi ...

. A pasture known as Amugulang, located in Honggor Sum, about north of Wulanhua, served as the landing site for the Shenzhou-6 spacecraft. A specially constructed road runs from Wulanhua to Honggor to aid the recovery of the Shenzhou spacecraft, and to boost the local economy. This road shortened the journey between the two towns from two hours to just 40 minutes. Chinese space program recovery teams (with SUV and recovery trucks) track the progress of re-entry near the landing site and arrive shortly after landing.Shenzhou 5
A small recovery trucks fitted with a crane lifts the capsule and places it on the rear of the truck for transportation back to the space centre. Since the final landing of Shenzhou 11 in Dorbod Banner in 2016, new facilities have been built to hasten the retrieval process for various spacecraft. In December 2020, the Chang'e 5 spacecraft landed in Dorbod Banner following a successful collection of Moon rocks.

Notes

References

{{authority control Ulanqab Spaceports in China Banners of Inner Mongolia