Cuiheng
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Cuiheng (Chinese: 翠亨村; Pinyin: Cuìhéngcūn) is a village located inside the territory of the town of Nanlang (南郎镇), depending from the prefecture-level city of Zhongshan, Guangdong province, in southern China. Cuiheng is the birthplace of Sun Yat-sen, the "Father of the Nation" of the Republic of China.
There is no county level between the town of Nanlang (at the township level) and the city of Zhongshan (at the prefecture level). When Sun Yat-sen was born, Nanlang was inside the county of Siangshan (pinyin: Xiangshan) (香山縣), itself depending from Canton prefecture (now Guangzhou) (府), Guangdong province. However, in 1925, at the death of Sun Yat-sen, the name of Siangshan county was changed into Chungshan (pinyin: Zhongshan) county to honor his memory. Then in 1983 it was turned into the county-level city of Zhongshan, and in 1988 it was elevated and made the prefecture-level city of Zhongshan (probably again to honor the home region of Sun Yat-sen), so that today there is no structure remaining at the county level.
For some time, the village of Cuiheng was even elevated to the township level and became the town of Cuiheng Village (翠亨村镇). However, in 1998 it was downgraded and reintegrated inside the town of Nanlang.
- Geographic coordinates: 113º31' E, 22º26' N
Cuiheng is 17.6 kilometres southeast of downtown Zhongshan, and only 26 km./16 miles north of Macao. The village was established in the latter half of the 17th century (during the reign of Kangxi Emperor) by the Feng (馮) and Mai (麥) families. Later joined by the Yang (楊) and Lu (陸) families (who came to be most numerous). At the time of Sun Yat-sen's birth in 1860s, there were about sixty households of ten surnames.
Located in Cuiheng is the Sun Yat-sen Residence Memorial Museum (孫中山故居紀念館), that was built in 1956, and was made a national protected unit (全国重点文物保护单位) in 1986 by the State Council of China. There is also a Polaris Temple (北極殿) dedicated to the Polaris Emperor (北極帝君).
Lu Muzhen, Sun's first wife; and Lu Hao-tung (1868-1895), an early revolutionary martyr, were also born here.
