Mountain range in China
39°12′N
98°32′E
/
39.200°N 98.533°E
/
39.200; 98.533
The
Qilian Mountains
(
simplified Chinese
:
祁?山
;
traditional Chinese
:
祁連山
;
pinyin
:
Qilian Sh?n
;
Wade?Giles
:
Ch'i
2
-lien
2
Shan
1
, also romanized as
Tsilien
;
Mongghul
: Chileb), together with the
Altyn-Tagh
(Altun Shan) also known as Nan Shan (
Chinese
:
南山
, literally "Southern Mountains"), as it is to the south of
Hexi Corridor
, is a northern outlier of the
Kunlun Mountains
, forming the border between
Qinghai
and the
Gansu
provinces of northern
China
.
[1]
Geography
[
edit
]
The range stretches from the south of
Dunhuang
some 800 km to the southeast, forming the northeastern escarpment of the
Tibetan Plateau
and the southwestern border of the
Hexi Corridor
.
The eponymous Qilian Shan peak, situated some 60 km south of
Jiuquan
, at
39°12′N
98°32′E
/
39.200°N 98.533°E
/
39.200; 98.533
, rises to 5,547 m. It is the highest peak of the main range, but there are two higher peaks further south, Kangze'gyai at
38°30′N
97°43′E
/
38.500°N 97.717°E
/
38.500; 97.717
with
5,808 m
and
Qaidam Shan peak at
38°2′N
95°19′E
/
38.033°N 95.317°E
/
38.033; 95.317
with
5,759 m
. Other major peaks include
Gangshiqia Peak
in the east.
The Nan-Shan range continues to the west as Yema Shan (5,250 m) and
Altun Shan (Altyn Tagh)
(5,798 m). To the east, it passes north of
Qinghai Lake
, terminating as Daban Shan and Xinglong Shan near
Lanzhou
, with Maoma Shan peak (4,070 m) an eastern outlier. Sections of the
Ming Dynasty
's
Great Wall
pass along its northern slopes, and south of northern outlier
Longshou Shan
(3,616 m).
The Qilian mountains are the source of numerous, mostly small, rivers and creeks that flow northeast, enabling irrigated agriculture in the
Hexi Corridor
(Gansu Corridor) communities, and eventually disappearing in the
Alashan Desert
. The best known of these streams is the
Ejin (Heihe) River
. The region has many
glaciers
, the largest of which is the
Touming Mengke
.
[2]
These glaciers have undergone acceleration in their melting in recent decades.
[3]
Lake Hala
is a large
brackish
lake, located within the Qilian mountains.
The
characteristic ecosystem
of the Qilian Mountains has been described by the
World Wildlife Fund
as the
Qilian Mountains conifer forests
.
[4]
Biandukou
(
扁都口
), with an altitude of over 3500 m, is a pass in the Qilian Mountains. It links
Minle County
of Gansu in the north and Qilian County of Qinghai in the south.
[5]
History
[
edit
]
The
Shiji
mentions the name "Qilian mountains" together with
Dunhuang
in relation to the homeland of the
Yuezhi
.
[6]
These
Qilian Mountains
however, has been suggested to be the mountains now known as
Tian Shan
, 1,500 km to the west.
[7]
Dunhuang
has also been argued to be the
Dunhong
mountain.
[8]
Qilian
(
祁?
) is said to be a Xiongnu word meaning "sky" (
Chinese
:
天
) according to
Yan Shigu
, a
Tang Dynasty
commentator on the
Hanshu
.
[9]
Sanping Chen (1998) suggested that 天
ti?n
, 昊天
haoti?n
, 祁連
qilian
, and 赫連
Helian
were all cognates and descended from multisyllabic
Proto-Sinitic
*
gh?klien
.
[10]
Schessler (2014) objects to Yan Shigu's statement that 祁連 was a Xiongnu word; he reconstructs 祁連's pronunciation in around 121 BCE as *
g?-lian
, apparently the same etymon as 乾 (?) the
Trigram
for "Heaven", in
standard Chinese
qian
<
Middle Chinese
QYS
*
gjan
<
Eastern Han Chinese
g?an
<
Old Chinese
*
gran
, which Schuessler etymologizes as from
Proto-Sino-Tibetan
and related to
Proto-Tibeto-Burman
*
m-ka-n
, cognate with
Written Tibetan
??? (
Wylie transliteration
: mkha') “heaven”.
[11]
[12]
The
Tuyuhun
were based around the Qilian mountains.
The mountain range was formerly known in European languages as Richthofen Range after
Ferdinand von Richthofen
, who was
the Red Baron
's explorer-geologist uncle.
[13]
The mountain range gives its name to Qinghai's
Qilian County
.
References
[
edit
]
- ^
The Journal of Asian studies
. Vol. 62. Association for Asian Studies. 2003. p. 262.
ISBN
0-691-09676-7
. Retrieved
2010-06-28
.
- ^
"Top 6 most beautiful glaciers in China"
.
China Daily
. 2012-07-15
. Retrieved
2017-04-18
.
It can be found in Laohu Valley on the northern slope of Daxue Mountain in Subei County.
- ^
Wong, Edward (2015-12-08).
"Chinese Glacier's Retreat Signals Trouble for Asian Water Supply"
.
New York Times
. p. A4
. Retrieved
2017-04-18
.
- ^
"Qilian Mountains conifer forests"
.
Terrestrial Ecoregions
. World Wildlife Fund.
- ^
"扁都口旅游景????目"
[Flat mouth tourist area development project] (in Chinese).
Xinhua
. 2005-12-20. Archived from
the original
on 2016-03-04
. Retrieved
2017-04-18
.
- ^
Sima Qian et al.,
Shiji
vol 123: "Account of Dayuan"
quote: "始月氏居敦煌、祁連閒". translation: "Initially the Yuezhi dwelt between Dunhuang and Qilian."
- ^
Mallory, J. P. & Mair, Victor H. (2000).
The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West
. Thames & Hudson. London. p.
58
.
ISBN
0-500-05101-1
.
- ^
Liu, Xinru
,
Migration and Settlement of the Yuezhi-Kushan: Interaction and Interdependence of Nomadic and Sedentary Societies
(2001)
[1]
- ^
班固 (20 August 2015).
漢書: ?師古註
.
祁連山?天山也,匈奴呼天?祁連 (translation: Qilian Mountain is the Tian Shan, the Xiongnu called the sky qilian)
- ^
Chen, Sanping. "Sino-Tokharico-Altaica ? Two Linguistic Notes".
Central Asiatic Journal
.
42
(1): 33-37.
- ^
Schuessler, Axel (2014). "Phonological Notes on Han Period Transcriptions of Foreign Names and Words".
Studies in Chinese and Sino-Tibetan Linguistics: Dialect, Phonology, Transcription and Text - Language and Linguistics Monograph Series
. Taipei, Taiwan: Institute of Linguistics, Academia Sinica (53). p. 274 of 249-292.
archived
from
original
- ^
Schuessler, Axel. 2007.
An Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese
. University of Hawaii Press. p. 425
- ^
Winchester, Simon. (2008).
The Man Who Loved China: the Fantastic Story of the Eccentric Scientist Who Unlocked the Mysteries of the Middle Kingdom,
p. 126.
External links
[
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]