Hángzhōu

Ibn Battuta, who arrived in 1345, called it the biggest city he had ever seen. In the wars that ended the Yuán, Zhāng Shìchéng seized Hángzhōu, rebuilt its walls and cut a new canal, giving the city the outline it would keep for centuries, before Zhū Yuánzhāng's army took it in 1366. Under the Míng it was the seat of Zhèjiāng province, and in the early 16th century the prefect Yáng Mèngyīng dredged West Lake and restored it to its old shape. The Qīng took the city in 1645 and drove the residents out of the houses on its western side by the lake; in 1650 they walled the quarter off as a city within the city for their Manchu bannermen. Yet the lakeside kept its prestige: in 1782 Zhèjiāng merchants paid for the Wénlán Pavilion on Gūshān, one of seven libraries built to hold the Qiánlóng emperor's great compilation, the Sìkù Quánshū.