Zhijin County is a

county A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...

under the administration of the

prefecture-level city A prefecture-level city () or prefectural city is an administrative division of the People's Republic of China (PRC), ranking below a province and above a county in China's administrative structure. During the Republican era, many of China' ...

Bijie Bijie () is a prefecture-level city in northwestern Guizhou Province, China, bordering Sichuan to the north and Yunnan to the west. The Daotianhe Reservoir, located to the north of the town was commissioned in 1965 with a rated annual capacity ...

in west-central

Guizhou Guizhou (; formerly Kweichow) is a landlocked province in the southwest region of the People's Republic of China. Its capital and largest city is Guiyang, in the center of the province. Guizhou borders the autonomous region of Guangxi to t ...

province, China.

History

Zhijin has been inhabited since the Qin, populated mainly by the Gelao. After the Jin, the Yi moved in. During the Kangxi Era of the

Qing The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speak ...

, a city was founded named Pingyuan. In 1914, it was renamed Zhijin after one of its streets.

Geography

Zhijin County is located in the southeastern part of

City, roughly in the middle of

province. It is 151 km from

Guiyang Guiyang (; ; Mandarin pronunciation: ), historically rendered as Kweiyang, is the capital of Guizhou province of the People's Republic of China. It is located in the center of the province, situated on the east of the Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau, ...

, 95 km from

Anshun Anshun () is a prefecture-level city located in southwestern Guizhou province, southwest China, near the Huangguoshu Waterfall, the tallest in China. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 2,297,339. The city proper had a population o ...

, 129 km from

Bijie City Bijie () is a prefecture-level city in northwestern Guizhou, Guizhou Province, China, bordering Sichuan to the north and Yunnan to the west. The Daotianhe Reservoir, located to the north of the town was commissioned in 1965 with a rated annual c ...

. It spans 82.5 km from East to West, and 66 km from North to South. Its total area is .

Karst topography Karst is a topography formed from the dissolution of soluble rocks such as limestone, dolomite, and gypsum. It is characterized by underground drainage systems with sinkholes and caves. It has also been documented for more weathering-resistant ...

dominates the landscape, with caves everywhere. The Zhijin Cave 22 km from the county seat is considered the most magnificent cave in China, and is a popular tourist spot. The highest point in the county has

altitude Altitude or height (also sometimes known as depth) is a distance measurement, usually in the vertical or "up" direction, between a reference datum and a point or object. The exact definition and reference datum varies according to the context ...

2262 m, and the lowest 1319 m.

Climate

The average temperature is 14.31 c, with annual rainfall 1356 mm.

Economy

The most important industry is tourism, with Zhijin Cave the number one attraction drawing tourists from all over China and the world.

Culture

Demographics

There are 23 ethnic groups living in Zhijin, including

Han Chinese The Han Chinese () or Han people (), are an East Asian ethnic group native to China. They constitute the world's largest ethnic group, making up about 18% of the global population and consisting of various subgroups speaking distinctive v ...

, Miao, Yi,

Hui The Hui people ( zh, c=, p=Huízú, w=Hui2-tsu2, Xiao'erjing: , dng, Хуэйзў, ) are an East Asian ethnoreligious group predominantly composed of Chinese-speaking adherents of Islam. They are distributed throughout China, mainly in the ...

and

Buyei The Bouyei (also spelled ''Puyi'', ''Buyei'' and ''Buyi''; self called: Buxqyaix, or "Puzhong", "Burao", "Puman"; ; vi, người Bố Y), otherwise known as the Zhongjia, are an ethnic group living in Southern Mainland China. Numbering 2.5 mi ...

. 48.02％ of Zhijin's population are considered minorities in China.

Administration

There are 11

towns A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

and 21

townships A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries. Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, Ca ...

in the county. Among them are: * Banqiao township

References

External links

Brief information about Zhijin County (in Chinese)Local Government website (in Chinese)Popular local forum(in Chinese)
County-level divisions of Guizhou Bijie {{Guizhou-geo-stub