Yǒngzhōu

Yongzhou denotes the Yong-Quan branch of Xiang Chinese, strung along the Hunan-Guangxi corridor from Qidong near Hengyang through the Lingling basin to Quanzhou and Xing'an across the Guangxi border; its main varieties include the speech of Yongzhou and Qiyang.

The region was ancient Lingling, where the Xiao and Xiang rivers meet. The Sui made it the prefecture of Yongzhou in the late sixth century, and in 805 the exiled Tang writer Liu Zongyuan settled here; his travel essays made its rivers and hills famous.

Yong-Quan dialects retain many voiced initials of Middle Chinese under heavy contact with Southwestern Mandarin. Under the Ming, Quanzhou was transferred to Guangxi, but its people kept their Xiang speech, so the branch still straddles both provinces.