Sōngpān

Songpan was a frontier region on the eastern Tibetan plateau, centred on Songzhou in northwestern Sichuan. In 1337 it lay within the Yuan Songpan-Weimao pacification office.

In 1379 the Ming established the Songzhou and Panzhou guards, later merging them as Songpan Guard. Its walled seat commanded tea-for-horse routes, while Tibetan tribes were largely governed through local chiefs and friendly lamas. The Qing stationed a garrison commander there; Songpan became a subprefecture in 1731 and an independent subprefecture in 1760.