History of Wuning

Wuning was Yihou’s territory in Shang Dynasty, and during the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period it belonged to the kingdoms of Wu, Yue and Chu. Later, Wuning belonged to Qin Dynasty and Haihun of the Han Dynasty respectively in the 23rd year under the rule of First Emperor Qin (224 BC) and the 3rd year under the rule Emperor Jing of Han (154 BC). Wuning County came into being in the 4th year of Jian An in the Eastern Han Dynasty (199 A D).

In the first year of Jin (280), Xi’an County was renamed as Yuning County. In the third year (559) of the Southern Dynasties, Yuning County built a prefecture which was removed in the 9th years (589) of Sui Dynasty, and was integrated into Jianchang County.

In the Tang Dynasty, Wuning covered a vast territory, known as “Wang County”. According to the record of the county annals, Wuning was once a big city governing 20 townships.

In the sixteen years (800) of Zhenyuan, the Supervisor Lixun separated Wuning to Xiushui (present Tonggu) in order to exempt the residents from city tax service.

In the Song Dynasty, cultural prosperity was thriving, and the county annals recorded that the population reached 126,949. In the first year of Shaoxing, Mr Chen built a private school at Liushan, thus people attached great importance to learning. In the history of China, 94 scholars were from Wuning.

In the Yuan Dynasty, Wuning was the capital city of Ningzhou Prefecture, governing Wuning County and Fenning County. In the fifth year (1301) of Dade, Fenning was renamed as Ningzhou Prefecture, while Wuning was governed directly by Rongxinlu.

In both of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, Wuning belonged to Nanchang Prefecture. The administrative divisions in the Ming dynasty were different from that in the Qing Dynasty. During Daoguang period of the Qing Dynasty, Wuning contained 13 towns and 16 streets, enjoying a prosperous market. Wuning enjoyed an annual output of 200,000 piece of grass cloth, 700,000 pieces of clay ceramics, and above 2,000 stacks of hand-made paper, 15,000 oiled paper umbrellas, based on historical records. Black tea of Wuning in the late Qing Dynasty was renowned both at home and abroad. Many foreign businessmen did tea business in Wuning, with the peak annual output of 1.2 million tons, 17 tea villages, and more than 2,000 tea workers.

During the period of the Republic of China of 1911, Wuning belonged to Xunyang which was removed in 1926. It was belonged to the 13th administrative region and the 9th administrative region in 1932 and in 1942 respectively. During the Agrarian Revolution period, the northern mountainous regions of Wuning, including Chuantan, Donglin, Nanyue, Wentang, Datong,Quankou and other regions successively set up the Soviet regime whose area accounted for 1/5 of the total area of the county.

On May 30, 1949, Wuning was liberated. The people’s government of Wuning which was subordinated to Jiujiang Administrative Bureau was established on September 20. In March of 1955, people’s government of Wuning County was renamed the people’s committee of Wuning County, and the county Revolutionary Committee was set up in June,1968. In 1970, the county moved to Nashiling due to the construction of Zhelin Reservoir. In March, 1981, Wuning set up the people’s government, under the jurisdiction of the Jiujiang Municipal People’s Government.