sichuan ** a province in the central-western china with its capital at **.
the territory of the province and its vicinity were the cradle of unique local civilizations,which can be dated to at least fif**th century bc(i.e.the later years of shang dynasty).beginning from the ninth century bc,shu(today **)and ba(today chongqing city)emerged as cultural and admin**trative centers where two rival kingdoms were establ**hed.
shu's ex**tence was unknown until an archaeological d**covery in 1986 at a small village named sanxingdui in guanghan county.believed to be an ancient city of the shu kingdom,the exc**ations yielded invaluable archaeological **rmation.
although the qin dynasty came to destroy the civilizations of shu and ba,the culture of shu and ba was preserved and inherited by people in sichuan until today.the qin ** also accelerated the technological and agricultural advancements of sichuan comparable to that of the huang he(yellow river)valley.the dujiangyan irrigation system,built in 3rd century bc under the inspection of li bing,was the symbol of modernization of that period.composed of a series of dams,it redirected the flow of min jiang,a major tributary of yangtze river,to fields and relieved the damage of seasonal floods.the construction and various other projects greatly increased the harvest of the area which thus became the main source of prov**ion and men for qin's unification of china.
various ores were abundant.adding to its significance,the area was also on the trade route from huang he valley to foreign countries of the southwest,especially india.
military importance matches the commercial and agricultural values.as the area ** actually a basin and ** surrounded by the himalayas to the west,the qinling range to the north,and mountainous areas of yunnan to the south,its climate ** often he**ily foggy.since the yangtze flows through the basin and thus ** upstream to areas of eastern china,n**ies could be easily sailed downstream.therefore the area was bases of numerous ambitious militarians and refuges of chinese **s throughout h**tory.a few independent regimes were founded;the most famous was shu han of the three kingdoms.the jin dynasty first conquered shu han on its path of unification.during the tang dynasty,it was a battlefront against **.
the southern song dynasty establ**hed coordinated defense against the mongolian yuan dynasty in sichuan and xiangyang.the line of defence was finally broken through after the first use of firearms in h**tory during the six-year siege of xiangyang,which ended in 1273.a plague in the 12th century depopulated the basin,after which it was repopulated by settlers from northern china.foggy climate hindered the accuracy of japanese bombing of the basin and the chongqing city where the capital of republic of china had moved to during world war ii.
sichuan's borders h**e remained relatively constant for the past 500 years.th** changed in 1997 when the city of chongqing as well as the surrounding towns of fuling and wanxian were formed into the new chongqing municipality.the new municipality was formed to spearhead china's effort to develop its western regions as well as to coordinate the resettlement of refugees from the three gorges dam project.
the li bai memorial,located at h** birthplace,zhongba town of northern jiangyou county in sichuan province,** a museum in memory of li bai,a chinese poet in the tang dynasty(618-907).it was prepared in 1962 on the occasion of 1,200th anniversary of h** death,completed in 1981 and opened to the public in october 1982.the memorial ** built in the style of the classic garden of the tang dynasty.