- Baidicheng
Baidi or Baidicheng (Simplified and
Traditional Chinese : 白帝城; 8 km east of the present dayFengjie County seat inChongqing municipality) is an ancient temple complex on a hill on the northern shore of theYangtze River inChina . The name literally means City of the White Emperor. It is said that the area was once surrounded with a white mist, giving it a rather mysterious yet serene look, much like what an emperor should be like. It has also been said that someone saw a white dragon, the symbol of the Emperor come out there, and the warlordGongsun Shu thought this was a fortuitous sign, and declared himself Emperor of Chengja. He founded the city and called himself the White Emperor.The temple is now an island due to the ruse in water levels since the construction of the
Three Gorges Dam . Much of the old structures were submerged and new buildings have been built higher up. The island is linked to the north bank of the Yangtze by a bridge. It continues to be a tourist attraction with many cruise ships stopping at Fengjie to allow tourists to visit.Baidi is also known as the City of Poems because so many poets, including the famous
Li Bai , wrote about it. Some, likeDu Fu , even resided there for a while. Baidicheng's coordinate is 31.045126 north, 109.545877 east.Baidi was also where
Liu Bei , first emperor of theKingdom of Shu during theThree Kingdoms era, died.In
2006 , the Chinese government established Baidi city as a National Heritage site.
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