Atlas of China
Kaifeng 开封Kāifēng
An iron-coloured pagoda, a painted scroll brought to life and soup dumplings
About Kaifeng
As Dongjing, Kaifeng was the capital of the Northern Song, and its Qing city wall still runs for more than 14 kilometres. The Iron Pagoda of 1049 takes its name from the colour of its glazed bricks, Daxiangguo Temple stands in the centre, and the Dragon Pavilion rises on a terrace between two lakes. Qingming Shanghe Park recreates Zhang Zeduan's scroll Along the River During the Qingming Festival, and Zhuxian Town is counted among China's four great centres of woodblock New Year prints.
What to eat in Kaifeng
- Kaifeng soup dumplings (灌汤包)
Featured places in Kaifeng
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Iron Pagoda 开封铁塔
A 56-metre glazed-brick pagoda of 1049 that has outlasted floods and earthquakes
Listed sites in Kaifeng
25 sites in Kaifeng are on the official lists. Those with a page of their own link to it; the rest open as cards on the map.
- Qingming Shanghe Park 清明上河园 5A scenic area · on the map
A Song-dynasty theme park opened in 1998 on the west shore of Longting Lake, built after Zhang Zeduan's 12th-century scroll Along the River During the Qingming Festival and the Song building manual Yingzao Fashi. - Aisijia Agricultural Carnival 爱思嘉农业嘉年华 4A scenic area · on the map
An agri-tourism park in the countryside south-west of Kaifeng, built around six themed exhibition halls on modern farming. - China Hanyuan Stele Forest 中国翰园碑林 4A scenic area · on the map
A garden of modern stone inscriptions just west of Dragon Pavilion Park, founded in 1985 by the retired Kaifeng official Li Gongtao and built up largely with his own family's money. - Daxiangguo Temple 大相国寺 4A scenic area · National heritage site
A large Buddhist temple in the centre of Kaifeng, with roots in the 6th century, refounded in 706 and renamed Daxiangguo Temple in 712, which under the Northern Song was the capital's leading monastery and a major trading market. - Dragon Pavilion 龙亭 4A scenic area · National heritage site
A Qing palace-style hall raised on a brick platform of 72 steps on the site of the Northern Song imperial palace in the north of Kaifeng's old city. - Jiao Yulu Memorial Park 焦裕禄纪念园 4A scenic area · National heritage site
A memorial park on the old Yellow River dyke at the northern edge of Lankao town for Jiao Yulu, the county's Communist Party secretary from 1962 until his death in 1964, who led local campaigns against drifting sand, waterlogging and salinised soil. - Kaifeng City Wall 开封城墙 4A scenic area · National heritage site
Kaifeng's Qing-dynasty city wall, rebuilt in grey brick in 1842 after a Yellow River flood, still runs for 14.4 km around the old city and is among the longest surviving city walls in China. - Kaifeng Prefecture Office (Kaifeng Fu) 开封府 4A scenic area · on the map
A modern reconstruction of the government office of Kaifeng Prefecture, which ran the Northern Song capital and where Bao Zheng, the 'Judge Bao' of later legend, served as prefect. - Lord Bao Memorial Temple, Kaifeng 开封包公祠 4A scenic area
A memorial temple to Bao Zheng (999–1062), the Northern Song official who became China's byword for incorruptible justice as 'Judge Bao' of opera and television. - Qifeng Old Garden, Zhuxian 启封故园 4A scenic area · on the map
A modern scenic area in old-town style at Zhuxian, one of the four great trading towns of Qing China, with a lake, bridges, a gate tower, a teahouse and shops built in traditional style. - Tianbo Yang Mansion 天波杨府 4A scenic area · on the map
A Song-style complex built in the 1990s beside the lakes of the Dragon Pavilion area, recreating the mansion of the Yang family generals, whose wars against the Liao are retold in the popular Generals of the Yang Family stories. - Wansui Mountain Wuxia City 万岁山武侠城 4A scenic area · on the map
A martial-arts-themed park on the northern edge of Kaifeng's old city, run as a scenic area since 2003 and renamed Wansui Mountain Wuxia City in December 2023. - Yellow River Bend Scenic Area, Lankao 黄河湾风景区 4A scenic area · on the map
A riverside scenic area at Dongbatou, where the Yellow River makes the last great bend of its course before turning north-east to the sea, and where in 1855 it burst its dyke and abandoned its old course to the south. - Dayun Temple Pagoda, Qi County 杞县大云寺塔 National heritage site · on the map
A seven-storey octagonal brick pagoda of the Ming dynasty at Wagang village, south of Qi County town, the surviving landmark of the former Dayun Temple. - Dongda Mosque, Kaifeng 开封东大寺 National heritage site
The principal mosque of Kaifeng's Hui Muslim community, first of the city's 'thirteen mosques' and historically called the leading mosque of Henan. - Former Residence of Liu Qingxia 刘青霞故居 National heritage site
The Kaifeng home of Liu Qingxia (1877–1922), a wealthy supporter of the Tongmenghui and of education, who funded revolutionaries and the Henan magazine published in Tokyo, founded Henan's first girls' school and in 1922 gave her family fortune to education. - Henan University Historic Buildings 河南留学欧美预备学校旧址 National heritage site · on the map
The early buildings of Henan University, founded in 1912 as the Henan Preparatory School for Study in Europe and America, on its old Minglun campus beside the Iron Pagoda. - Kaifeng Parachute Tower 开封伞塔 National heritage site · on the map
A reinforced-concrete tower about 85 m tall, built in 1955–56 to train airborne troops and sport parachutists, who were hoisted beneath open canopies and released from three cantilevered platforms near the top. - Po Pagoda 繁塔 National heritage site
The oldest standing building in Kaifeng, a Northern Song brick pagoda begun in the 970s for Tianqing Temple on the Fan Terrace beside Yuwangtai and finished around 990 after some twenty years of work. - Shanshangan Guild Hall 山陕甘会馆 National heritage site
A guild hall built in 1776 by merchants from Shanxi, Shaanxi and Gansu living in Kaifeng, on the site of a Ming mansion of the descendants of the general Xu Da. - Site of Dongjing, the Northern Song Capital 北宋东京城遗址 National heritage site
The remains of Dongjing, capital of the Northern Song from 960 to 1127, lie buried under modern Kaifeng beneath the silt of later Yellow River floods. - Xingguo Temple Pagoda, Weishi 尉氏兴国寺塔 National heritage site · on the map
A hexagonal brick pagoda of eight storeys, about 30 m tall, first built in the Taiping Xingguo era of the early Northern Song as the relic pagoda of Xingguo Temple, known locally as the Dongguan (East Suburb) Pagoda. - Yanqing Temple (Jade Emperor Pavilion) 延庆观 National heritage site
A Taoist temple of the Quanzhen school founded in 1233 where its founder Wang Chongyang died in 1170, renamed Yanqing Guan in 1373 and repeatedly destroyed by floods and war. - Yue Fei Temple, Zhuxian 朱仙镇岳飞庙 National heritage site
A temple to the Southern Song general Yue Fei, founded in 1478 at Zhuxian, the town his army reached after defeating the Jin at Yancheng, and regarded as one of China's principal Yue Fei temples. - Zhuxian Mosque 朱仙镇清真寺 National heritage site
A mosque founded in the Ming and rebuilt in 1738, a reminder that Zhuxian's Ming and Qing trade drew Hui merchants who built several mosques in the town.
On the map
Open Kaifeng on the illustrated map to see its outline, its places and listed sites together, and to add them to a trip.
Open Kaifeng on the map