Hézhōu

Hezhou, based at Fuhan was a frontier trading centre in southwestern Gansu. Under the Mongols it became Hezhou Route in 1269, subject to the Tufan commission governing Amdo.

In 1370 Ming general Deng Yu took Hezhou and accepted Sonam Gonpo’s surrender. Granted the surname He, he became in 1371 a hereditary officer of the Hezhou Guard; his family ruled the Dongxiang hills as tusi. A tea-and-horse market drew migrants, and within a century of the conquest the population became predominantly Hui. Hezhou was restored as a department in 1473 and passed to Lanzhou Prefecture in 1738.