Wandu Mountain City (丸都山城)

Wandu Mountain City is the hill fortress that served as the military refuge of the Goguryeo kingdom, standing on Mount Wandu a few kilometres north of Ji'an in Jilin province. Founded in the early 3rd century AD, it was the companion of the lowland capital Gonnei City and is part of the UNESCO World Heritage property Capital Cities and Tombs of the Ancient Koguryo Kingdom, inscribed in 2004. The fortress was built to exploit a natural bowl of steep ridges, closed on its open side by a long circuit of stone wall, and it was used as a capital in its own right after Gonnei fell to attack. Historical records describe assaults by the Wei general Guanqiu Jian in 244 AD and by the Former Yan kingdom in 342 AD, the latter leaving the city badly damaged. The walls follow the ridgelines for roughly seven kilometres and were laid with carefully dressed stone blocks. Within the enclosure archaeologists have identified gate sites, lookout platforms, a large palace foundation with stone column bases, barracks areas, and a reservoir known as the lotus pond. The palace terraces and the south gate are the most visited features, reached by a climb on stone steps. The setting is as much an attraction as the ruins: from the upper wall visitors look down over the Ji'an basin and the Yalu River. Wandu Mountain City was extensively excavated and consolidated in the early 2000s ahead of its World Heritage nomination, and some wall sections have been partly rebuilt in modern stone. The site is open-air and is usually visited as part of the combined Ji'an heritage ticket, together with the General's Tomb and the Hotaiwang Stele. Allow about two hours including the climb and the descent.