Introduction to the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal

The world-famous Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is the earliest and longest man-made river in the world.

The Grand Canal starts from Beijing in the north and reaches Hangzhou in the south, running through the Haihe, Huanghe, Huaihe, Yangtze and Qiantang Rivers, linking these five major water systems. Flowing through six provinces and cities, including Beijing, Hebei, Tianjian, Shandong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang, the Grand Canal has a total length of 1,794 kilometers, with only 883 kilometers of navigable mileage remaining. It is the earliest man-made river in the world with the largest project and the longest route. In the history of the development of the Chinese nation, it has made great contributions to the development of north-south transportation and the communication of economic and cultural links between the north and the south. It is ten times longer than the Suez Canal (opened in 1859 and navigated in 1869, with a length of 170 kilometers), which connects the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea, and more than twenty times longer than the Panama Canal (opened in 1881 and navigated in 1920, with a length of 81.3 kilometers), which connects the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans.

The Beijing-Hangzhou Canal is also called the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, or simply the Grand Canal or Canal. It has survived the vicissitudes of more than 2,000 years, its fate from prosperity to decline. It was once the lifeline of the country, sustaining the prosperity of the feudal dynasty; it is a monument in the history of China's water conservancy engineering, showing the ingenuity of the ancients; it is a river of blood and tears, soaked with the suffering of countless people.

The Beijing-Hangzhou Canal is a great project that the children of China are proud of. The path of the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal's life is long and winding, and it has been expanded and reconstructed many times, after more than 2,000 years of wind and rain. It is like a recorder of the times, witnessing the splendor and blandness of the past.

Today's Grand Canal is basically a river that was last dredged during the Qianlong period of the Qing Dynasty. Since the beginning of the Sui Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty, the Grand Canal has always been a major artery for north-south transportation, but in the Republic of China, after the opening of the Jinpu (Pukou, from Tianjin to Nanjing) Railway, which runs through the north and south of the country, the Grand Canal gradually lost its importance as a north-south transportation, and declined to become a regional transportation network. Many sections of the river appeared silted up, to the dry season that is to be cut off, in some periods, and even cause Jiangsu, Shanghai, Zhejiang and other places with coal emergency. In recent years, the Grand Canal has been emphasized again, especially in the planning of the South-to-North Water Diversion Project, the Grand Canal will play an important role, the Grand Canal re-governance of the project is underway, dredging and dredging has been the first results.

The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal began to be cut in 486 B.C., and was fully navigable in 1293 A.D., before and after **** lasted 1,779 years. In the long years, the main experience of three larger repair process.

The first time was in the fifth century BC at the end of the Spring and Autumn period. At that time, the ruler of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, King Wu Fu-chai, in order to go north to attack Qi, to compete for the hegemony of the Central Plains, mobilized the people to excavate the canal (i.e., today's Li-Canal) from the northeast of present-day Yangzhou, through the Shiyang Lake to Huai'an into the Huaihe River, because of the passage through the city of Gan, so called "Generali Gully", a total of 170 kilometers in length, to bring the Yangtze River water into the Huaihe River, the first section of the Canal was constructed. It was the earliest section of the Grand Canal to be constructed.

As the longest, largest and oldest canal in the world, the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal and the Great Wall are known as the two great projects of ancient China. It starts from Hangzhou in the south and reaches Beijing in the north, connecting the five major water systems of the Haihe River, Yellow River, Huaihe River, Yangtze River and Qiantang River. Currently, the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is in the process of being declared a world heritage site.

The excavation of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, such a huge project, was not completed in one go; it a***empted three excavations to reach its present length. The final full length of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal can be divided into three sections, namely the Tonghui River, the Northern Canal, the Southern Canal, the Lu Canal, the Central Canal, the Li Canal and the Jiangnan Canal. As China's second "golden waterway" after the Yangtze River, the importance of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is obvious.

Expanded information:

The main role of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal

The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal changed China's geography, forming an all-encompassing north-south, east-west water network, which directly drove the development of the economy and the rise of cities along the canal. .

①Convenient Transportation

The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is a major transportation artery connecting the five major water systems, which greatly facilitates and saves the transportation of leather and timber from the north to the south, or grain and rice, tea, and bamboo weaving from the south to the north.

②Agricultural development

The development of the Grand Canal is closely linked with the cause of agricultural water conservancy construction, with the excavation of waterways, water diversion and storage of water discharge project implementation, to eliminate flooding and irrigation as the main content of the canal role quickly obvious up, the canal area of water conservancy field to get a substantial expansion, especially the south of the dike, the northern part of the silt field, various types of water conservancy field and the canal on both sides of the official field and cantonment, etc. The government fields and cantonment fields and so on have increased significantly.

③Commercial prosperity

The passage of the Grand Canal greatly promoted the development of commerce and handicrafts in the canal area. In the coastal areas, especially in the cities on both sides of the canal, the commercial atmosphere is still strong.

References:

People's Daily Online-Grand Canal: The World's Longest Existing Artificial Canal