Beijing: Its Characteristics of Historical Development and Transformation

Abstract

On this issue, I want to give a simple but concrete example. That is how we are to build up our people’s capital in the new socialist era on the basis of the ancient city of Beijing.

Today I am going to deal with my first topic: “The City of Beijing—A Historical Perspective”. Next time I’ll come to my second topic: “The New Metropolitan Planning of the City of Beijing”.

When published in the Historical Geography, vol. 2, a short note was added by the author at the beginning of the essay, saying, “In the spring of 1980, the writer was invited by the University of British Columbia to give short-term lectures and three public speeches in Canada. Now the two original Chinese speeches regarding the historical geography of Beijing have been edited and integrated into one with a new title. If there are any omissions or errors, the readers are free to give suggestions.” This article above is transcribed from the author’s original speech manuscripts.—Editor’s note.