Guangxi
Guangxi, officially the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China, located in South China and bordering Vietnam and the Gulf of Tonkin. Formerly a province, Guangxi became an autonomous region in 1958. Its current capital is Nanning.
Guangxi's location, in mountainous terrain in the far south of China, has placed it on the frontier of Chinese civilization throughout much of Chinese history. The current name "Guang" means "expanse" and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in 226 AD. It was given provincial level status during the Yuan dynasty, but even into the 20th century, it was considered an open, wild territory. The abbreviation of the region comes from the name of the city of Guilin, the provincial capital during both the Ming and Qing dynasties.
Guangxi has the largest ethnic minority population in China. In 2021, a report stated the Zhuang people accounted for 31.36% of the region's population. Various regional languages and dialects such as Pinghua, Zhuang, Kam, Cantonese, Hakka, and Min are spoken alongside Mandarin Chinese.
Name
"Guǎng" means 'expanse' or 'vast', and has been associated with the region since the creation of Guang Prefecture in AD 226. Guangxi and neighboring Guangdong literally mean 'expanse west' and 'expanse east'. Together, Guangxi and Guangdong are called Liangguang. During the Song dynasty, the Two Guangs were formally separated as Guǎngnán Xīlù and Guǎngnán Dōnglù, which became abbreviated as Guǎngxī Lù and Guǎngdōng Lù.Guangxi was also previously spelled as Kwangsi in postal and Wade–Giles romanizations. The spelling of the province was replaced by the pinyin spelling of Guangxi in 1958 and has been widely used internationally after 1986. The official name was also known as Kwangsi Chuang Autonomous Region in a number of Western publications outside of China published in the 1950s to 1970s.
History
Originally inhabited by a mixture of tribal groups known to the Chinese as the Baiyue, the region first became part of China during the Qin dynasty. In 214 BC, the Han Chinese general Zhao Tuo claimed most of southern China for Qin Shi Huang before the emperor's death. The ensuing civil war permitted Zhao to establish a separate kingdom at Panyu known as Nanyue. Alternatively submissive to and independent of Han dynasty control, Southern Yue expanded colonization and sinicization under its policy of "Harmonizing and Gathering the Hundred Yue" until its collapse in 111 BC during the southward expansion of the Han dynasty.The name "Guangxi" can be traced to the "Expansive" or "Wide" province of the Eastern Wu, which controlled southeastern China during the Three Kingdoms period. Guilin formed one of its commanderies.
Under the Tang dynasty, the Zhuang moved to support Piluoge's kingdom of Nanzhao in Yunnan, which successfully repulsed imperial armies in 751 and 754. Guangxi was then divided into an area of Zhuang ascendancy west of Nanning and an area of Han ascendancy east of Nanning.
After the collapse of the Southern Zhao, Liu Yan established the Southern Han in Xingwangfu. Although this state gained minimal control over Guangxi, it was plagued by instability and annexed by the Song dynasty in 971. The name "Guangxi" itself can be traced to the Song, who administered the area as the Guangnanxi Circuit. Harassed by both Song and the Jiaozhi in modern Vietnam, the Zhuang leader Nong Zhigao led a revolt in 1052 for which he is still remembered by the Zhuang people. His independent kingdom was short-lived, however, and the tattooed Song general Di Qing returned Guangxi to China.
The Yuan dynasty established control over Yunnan during its conquest of the Dali Kingdom in 1253 and eliminated the Southern Song following the Battle of Yamen in 1279. Rather than ruling Lingnan as a subject territory or military district, the Mongolians then established Guangxi as a proper province. The area nonetheless continued to be unruly, leading the Ming dynasty to employ the different local groups against one another. At the Battle of Big Rattan Gorge between the Zhuang and the Yao in 1465, 20,000 deaths were reported.
During the Ming and Qing dynasties, parts of Guangxi were ruled by the powerful Cen clan. The Cen were of Zhuang ethnicity and were recognized as tusi or local rulers by the Chinese emperors.
The Qing dynasty left the region alone until the imposition of direct rule in 1726, but the 19th century was one of constant unrest. A Yao revolt in 1831 was followed by the Jintian Uprising, the beginning of the Taiping Rebellion, in January 1851 and the Da Cheng Rebellion in April 1854. The execution of St. Auguste Chapdelaine by local officials in Guangxi provoked the Second Opium War in 1858 and the legalization of foreign interference in the interior. Although Louis Brière de l'Isle was unable to invade its depot at Longzhou, the Guangxi Army saw a great deal of action in the 1884 Sino-French War. Largely ineffective within Vietnam, it was still able to repulse the French from China itself at the Battle of Zhennan Pass on 23 March 1885.
Following the Wuchang Uprising, Guangxi seceded from the Qing Empire on 6 November 1911. The Qing governor, Shen Bingdan, initially remained in place but was subsequently removed by a mutiny commanded by General Lu Rongting. General Lu's Old Guangxi clique overran Hunan and Guangdong as well and helped lead the National Protection War against Yuan Shikai's attempt to re-establish an imperial government. Zhuang's loyalty made his Self-Government Army cohesive but reluctant to move far beyond its own provinces. Subsequent feuding with Sun Yat-sen led to defeat in the 1920 and 1921 Guangdong–Guangxi War. After a brief occupation by Chen Jiongming's Cantonese forces, Guangxi fell into disunity and profound banditry for several years until Li Zongren's Guangxi Pacification Army established the New Guangxi clique dominated by Li, Huang Shaohong, and Bai Chongxi.
Successful action in Hunan against Wu Peifu led to the Zhuang GPA becoming known as the "Flying Army" and the "Army of Steel". After the death of Sun Yat-sen, Li also repulsed Tang Jiyao's revolt and joined the Northern Expedition establishing control over other warlords by the Republic of China. His was one of the few Kuomintang units free from serious Chinese Communist Party influence and was therefore employed by Chiang Kai-shek for the Shanghai massacre of 1927. Within the People's Republic of China, Guangxi is also noted for the Baise Uprising, a failed CCP revolt led by Chen Zhaoli and Deng Xiaoping in 1929.
In 1937, the Guangxi Women's Battalion was founded as a response to Soong Mei-ling's appeal for women to support the Sino-Japanese War. Reports on the size of the battalion vary from 130 students, to 500, to 800.
Being in the far south, Guangxi did not fall during the Chinese Civil War, but joined the People's Republic in December 1949, two months after its founding.
In 1952, a small section of Guangdong's coastline was given to Guangxi, giving it access to the sea. This was reversed in 1955, and then restored in 1965. This made Guangxi the only autonomous region which is not landlocked.
The Guangxi Massacre, during the Cultural Revolution, involved the killing of 100,000 to 150,000 in the region in 1967 and 1968.
While some development of heavy industry occurred in the 1960s and 1970s, the region remained largely a scenic tourist destination. Even the economic growth of the 1990s seemed to leave Guangxi behind. However, in recent years, there has been a growing amount of industrialization and increasing concentration on cash crops. Per capita GDP has risen as industries in Guangdong transfer production to comparatively lower-wage areas in Guangxi.
During the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese War, Guangxi communities were important to the Chinese war effort. They supplied logistical support to the People's Liberation Army, including food and housing. Militia members from Guangxi performed tasks including building roads, bridges, trenches, other logistical efforts, and caring for the wounded.
Geography
Located in the southern part of the country, Guangxi is bordered by Yunnan to the west, Guizhou to the north, Hunan to the northeast, and Guangdong to the east and southeast. It is also bordered by Vietnam in the southwest and the Gulf of Tonkin in the south. Its proximity to Guangdong is reflected in its name, with "Guang" being used in both names.Large portions of Guangxi are hilly and mountainous. The northwest portion of Guangxi includes part of the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, the Jiuwan Mountains and the Fenghuang Mountains both run through the north, the Nanling Mountains form the region's north-east border, and the Yuecheng and Haiyang Mountains both branch from the Nanling Mountains. Also in the north are the Duyao Mountains. The Duyang Mountains run through the west of Guangxi. Near the center of the region are the Da Yao and Da Ming Mountains. On the southeastern border are the Yunkai Mountains. Guangxi's highest point is Kitten Mountain, in the Yuecheng Mountains, at.
Karst landforms, characterized by steep mountains and large caverns, are common in Guangxi, accounting for 37.8 percent of its total land area.
Guangxi is also home to several river systems, which flow into several different bodies of water: the Qin River and the Nanliu River both flow into the Gulf of Tonkin, several tributary rivers flow into the larger Xiang River in neighbouring Hunan province, and the Xi River system flows southeast through the autonomous region into the South China Sea.
Along the border with Vietnam there is the Ban Gioc–Detian waterfall, which separates the two countries.
About one-quarter of Guangxi's area is forested.