Jiēyáng

Jiēyáng takes its name from the Jieyang ridge, one of the Five Ridges, and the Han first made it a county in 111 BC; in 331 the Eastern Jin split it into four counties, and for centuries the name lapsed. The county was re-established from Haiyang in 1138, and its seat was built at Yujiao village in 1140, on the Rong River in the Chaozhou region of eastern Guangdong. Through the Yuan, Ming and Qing, Jieyang remained a county of Chaozhou rather than a separate prefectural capital.

The Confucian academy, temples and gates stood beside the county government. The academy was the setting for official rites and for the education of examination candidates, tying the local scholarly families to the imperial institutions, and Jinxian Gate, whose name evokes the advancement of worthy men, belonged to the same civic culture. The Rong River joined the county town to the villages and workshops of its basin, which flourished in the Ming and Qing.