- Wei River
The Wei River (
Simplified Chinese :渭河;pinyin : Wei He;Wade-Giles : Wei Ho) is ariver in west-centralChina and is the largesttributary of theYellow River . The source of the Wei River is close toWeiyuan County inGansu province. Weiyuan (渭源) literally means "Wei's source". At its source, it is less than 200 kilometres from the Yellow River atLanzhou . However, due to the sharp turn north the Yellow River takes in Lanzhou, the Wei and the Yellow Rivers do not meet for more than 2000 km further along the Yellow River's course. In a direct line, its source lies 700 kilometres west of the main city along its course,Xi'an in theShaanxi province. The length of the river is 818 kilometres and the area drained covers 135.000 km² Its valley was one of the early cradles of Chinese civilisation, along which the capitals of the Qin, (Xianyang ), Han and Tang Dynasties were situated. The area inDingxi City, Gansu Province, around its headwaters, has numerousstone age sites from various early cultures. In September of 2003 extensive rainfall led to flooding that caused over 30 fatalities, and temporarily displaced over 300,000 persons. [ [http://www.mindfully.org/Air/2003/China-Flood-Hit2sep03.htm "17,000 Houses Collapse, 200,000 Evacuated in Flood-Hit China", Agence France-Presse 2 sept 03] ] Ecological aspects of the Wei River have been examined with respect to flow rates in the Wei River. [ [http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/cgi-bin/abstract/114088380/ABSTRACT?CRETRY=1&SRETRY=0 J.X Song, Z.X. Xu, C.M. Liu, H.E. Li, "Ecological and environmental instream flow requirements for the Wei River - the largest tributary of the Yellow River", 24 Jan. 2007] ]History
The headwaters of the Wei River are notable in the ancient history of the
Northern Silk Road , one of four "Silk Roads" of antiquity. According to C. Michael Hogan, the Chinese segment of the Northern Silk Road is "the northernmost route of some 2600 kilometres, which connects the ancient Chinese capital of Xian to the west via the Chinese cities of Baoji, Tianshui (at the headwater gorges of the Wei River), Lanzhou, Dunhuang, over the Wushao Ling Pass to Wuwei and emerging in Kashgar, China before linking to ancient Parthia. This route traverses the provinces of Shaanxi and Gansu as well as the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. This most northern of theSilk Road s is characterised by its looping north of the Taklamakan Desert." [ [http://www.megalithic.co.uk/article.php?sid=18006 C.Michael Hogan, "Silk Road, North China", The Megalithic Portal, ed. Andy Burnham] ]The Wei Valley is likely the earliest center of Chinese civilisation, and also the location of China's first major irrigation works. [ [http://concise.britannica.com/ebc/article-9382495/Wei-River Encyclopedia Brittanica Online Concise] ]
References
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