page_title: History of the administrative divisions of China before 1912
section_title: Circuits under the Liao, Song and Jurchen Jin dynasties
hierarchical_section_title: History of the administrative divisions of China before 1912 / Circuits under the Liao, Song and Jurchen Jin dynasties
caption_attribution_description: English: Circuits of Northern Song Dynasty (as of 1111 A.D.)
context_page_description: The history of the administrative divisions of the Imperial China is quite complex. Across history, what is called 'China' has taken many shapes, and many political organizations. For various reasons, both the borders and names of political divisions have changed—sometimes to follow topography, sometimes to weaken former states by dividing them, and sometimes to realize a philosophical or historical ideal. For recent times, the number of recorded tiny changes is quite large; by contrast, the lack of clear, trustworthy data for ancient times forces historians and geographers to draw approximate borders for respective divisions. But thanks to imperial records and geographic descriptions, political divisions may often be redrawn with some precision. Natural changes, such as changes in a river's course, or loss of data, still make this issue difficult for ancient times.
context_section_description: The Liao dynasty was further divided into five "circuits", each with a capital city. The general idea for this system was taken from the Balhae, although no captured Balhae cities were made into circuit capitals. The five capital cities were Shangjing (上京), meaning Supreme Capital, which is located in modern-day Inner Mongolia; Nanjing (南京), meaning Southern Capital, which is located near modern-day Beijing; Dongjing (东京), meaning Eastern Capital, which is located near modern-day Liaoning; Zhongjing (中京), meaning Central Capital, which is located in modern-day Hebei province near the Laoha river; and Xijing (西京), meaning Western Capital, which is located near modern-day Datong. Each circuit was headed by a powerful viceroy who had the autonomy to tailor policies to meet the needs of the population within his circuit. Circuits were further subdivided into administrations called fu (府), which were metropolitan areas surrounding capital cities, and outside of metropolitan areas were divided into prefectures called zhou (州), which themselves were divided into counties called xian (县).
  The Song dynasty abolished the commissioners and renamed their circuits 路 (lù, which however is still usually translated into English as "circuits"). They also added a number of army/military prefectures (州级军 zhouji jun, or simply 軍/军, jūn).
  Circuits (路, lù)
  Prefectures (larger: 府, fǔ; smaller: 州, zhōu; military: 軍/军, jūn)
  Counties
  The Jurchens invaded China proper in Jin–Song wars of the 12th century. In 1142, peace was formalized between the Jurchen Jin dynasty and the Southern Song dynasty, which was forced to cede all of North China to the Jurchens.
  By the beginning of the 13th century, the Jurchens had moved their capital to Zhongdu (modern Beijing) and had adopted Chinese administrative structures. The Song dynasty also maintained the same structure over the southern half of China that they continued to govern.
caption: Circuits of Northern Song dynasty (as of 1111 AD)
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