Kuan Alley and Zhai Alley
Qing-era garrison alleys of gray-tiled courtyard homes, once wide for officers and narrow for soldiers.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to Kuan Alley and Zhai Alley in Chengdu opens around 1718, when the military governor Nian Gengyao asked Emperor Kangxi for permission to build a permanent garrison town on the city's edge, laying out wide alleys for officers and narrow ones for common troops. It follows Nian's meteoric rise under the new Yongzheng Emperor, from duke to grand guardian, and the whispers that began accusing him of acting like an equal to the throne. The two alleys he laid out still carry the names his soldiers gave them three centuries ago.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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