Xìnyáng

Xinyang stands at the meeting of the southern Henan plain and the wooded hills bordering the upper Huai basin. Once called Yiyang, it was the seat of Shenzhou under the Tang and later received the name Xinyang. The area's mountains have long produced tea: the Tang writer Lu Yu listed Yiyang among the tea-growing districts of Huainan in his Classic of Tea.

Under the Ming and Qing, Xinyang was a prefectural centre within the wider Runing administration. Its position near the passes through the southern mountains placed it on routes between Henan and the lands of the middle Yangtze. Warfare at the end of the Ming and migration under the Qing altered the population of the region; families from Jiangxi and other southern provinces came to settle in the countryside around Xinyang.