The richness of China’s ancient architecture will once again come to the surface with yet another excavation project being undertaken, this time in Kaifeng, Henan Province, as was confirmed by local government officials last month.

The excavation reveals Kaifeng, once serving as the capital to seven dynasties, as not a single city but as a layered “city over city,” successively built upon the ruins of previous dynasties. In order to exhibit the partly unearthed site, the Xinzhengmen Museum will be constructed, also housing the site’s artifact center.

This so-called “city over city” will be displayed in an exhibit to the public revealing six cities overlapping each other, much like the layers of a pagoda. These different incarnations of Kaifeng include three capital cities, two provincial capitals and one major metropolitan area. Discovered at depths of 10 meters, 8 meters and 6 meters are layers representing the ruins of Daliang, Warring States period (475-221 BC), Dongjing, Northern Song Dynasty (960-1127) and Bianjing, Jin Dynasty (1115-1234), respectively.

“Regarding its scale and layers, Kaifeng is one of the most extraordinary constructions in Chinese history. To some extent, the city of Kaifeng reveals the flux of the changing dynasties, serving as a ‘living fossil,’ offering a glimpse of the customs and architecture during these key periods of ancient China,” Liu Chunying, an archaeologist and officer in Kaifeng’s Culture Relics Bureau, said.

Source: Global Times