Nanjing has been cursed with an interesting history. Due to its strategic position on the Chang Jiang, it was a disputed prize during the Warring States period (476-221 BC). Under the Qin dynasty, which finally unified all of China, Nanjing enjoyed a period of stability as it served as the administrative center for the surrounding region. Its importance grew during the Western and Eastern Han dynasties, until the fall of the Eastern Han dynasty in 220 AD, when Nanjing became the capital of the state of Wu. With the overthrow of the Wu state however, Nanjing suffered from the strife that wracked China for the next 300 years. The years 507-589 in particular brought Nanjing a series of natural disasters, rebellions and invasions. In 589 General Wen Di captured Nanjing and destroyed all its important buildings, in order to firmly establish Beijing as the only capital of a united China. Nanjing enjoyed peaceful obscurity until 1368, when the first emperor of the Ming dynasty established his capital there. A brief period of prosperity followed with the building of new fortifications and the establishment of many commercial, administrative and educational institutions. But in 1420 the capital was returned to Beijing and Nanjing fell again into relative obscurity.

When British warships sailed up the Chang Jiang during the Opium War of 1842 they forced the Chinese government to sign the Treaty of Nanjing, which has been known ever since in China as the first of the “unequal treaties” it was to suffer under the western imperial powers. During the Taiping Rebellion of 1851-1864, it was the base of the rebel leader Hong Xiuquan, which ended when Nanjing was stormed by a combined army of Chinese and foreigners. Yet another upheaval came after 1911, when the Guomindang (Chinese Nationalists) under Sun Yatsen overthrew the Qing dynasty and eventually moved the capital from Beijing to Nanjing. During the Japanese invasion of 1937 Nanjing resisted strongly, but when it finally fell the Japanese subjected the city to what has been known ever since as the Nanjing Massacre, in which an estimated 300,000 people were murdered. After the Second World War ended in 1945 the nationalists again established their capital in Nanjing, but this period ended in 1949 with its capture by the Communists and the establishment of Beijing as capital of the People’s Republic of China.

Peaceful and prosperous once more, Nanjing is an important commercial, industrial and cultural center. Major industries include motor vehicles, machine tools, textiles, chemicals and electronics.

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