Khanbaliq

• Name — Dadu Khanbaliq • Image Map — Map of Cambaluk.jpg • Type — Former capital city • Location — Beijing, China • Founded — 1264 • Founder — Kublai Khan

• Title — Dadu • C — (元)大都 • L — Grand Capital (of Yuan) • P — (Yuán) Dàdū • W — (Yüan) Ta-tu • Mong — ᠳᠠᠶ᠋ᠢᠳᠤ • Monr — Daidu

• Title — Khanbaliq • C — 汗八里 • P — Hànbālǐ • W — Han-pa-li • Mong — cmg • Monr — Haan balgas

• Title — Beiping • C — 北平 • P — Běipíng • W — Pei-p'ing • L — [Seat of the] Northern Pacified [Area] • Illustration — While "Cambaluc" was known to European geographers, its exact location – or its identity with Beijing – was not quite clear. This map from 1610 repeats a fairly common pattern for the period: it shows two Khanbaliqs ("Combalich" in the land of "Kitaisk" on the Ob River and "Cambalu" in "Cataia" north of the Great Wall) and one Beijing ("Paquin", at its correct location in "Xuntien" prefecture). Dadu (ᠳᠠᠶ᠋ᠢᠳᠤ, Dayidu) or Khanbaliq (ᠬᠠᠭᠠᠨ ᠪᠠᠯᠭᠠᠰᠤ, Qaɣan balɣasu) was the winter capital of the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty in what is now Beijing, the capital of China today. The Secretariat directly administered the Central Region (腹裏) of the Yuan dynasty (comprising present-day Beijing, Hebei, Shandong, Shanxi, and parts of Henan and Inner Mongolia) and dictated policies for the other provinces. As emperors of the Yuan dynasty, Kublai Khan and his successors also claimed supremacy over the entire Mongol Empire following the death of Möngke (Kublai's brother and predecessor) in 1259. Over time the unified empire gradually fragmented into a number of khanates. Dadu is the direct predecessor to modern Beijing. Several stations of the modern city's subway's Line 10 and Line 13 are named after the gates of Dadu.

The name Dadu is the pinyin transcription of the Chinese name 大都, meaning "Grand Capital". The Mongols also called the city Daidu, which was a transliteration directly from the Chinese. In modern Chinese, it is referred to as Dadu of Yuan or Yuan Dadu to distinguish it from other cities which have similar names. The name Khanbaliq comes from the Mongolic khan ("ruler", "king") and balik ("town", "permanent settlement"): "City of the Khan". It was actually in use among the Turks and Mongols before the fall of Zhongdu, in reference to the Jin emperors of Manchuria. It is traditionally written as Cambaluc in English, after its spelling in Rustichello's retelling of Marco Polo's travels. The Travels also uses the spellings Cambuluc and Kanbalu.

Zhongdu, the "Central Capital" of the Jurchen Jin dynasty, was located at a nearby site now part of Xicheng District. It was destroyed by Genghis Khan in 1215 when the Jin court began contemplating a move south to a more defensible capital such as Kaifeng. The Imperial Mint (诸路交钞提举司) established in 1260 and responsible for the printing of jiaochao, the Yuan fiat paper money, was probably located at nearby Yanjing even before the establishment of the new capital. In 1264, Kublai Khan visited the Daming Palace on Jade Island in Taiye Lake and was so enchanted with the site that he directed his capital to be constructed around the garden. The chief architect and planner of the capital was Liu Bingzhong, who also served as supervisor of its construction. His student Guo Shoujing and the Muslim Ikhtiyar al-Din were also involved. The construction of the walls of the city began in the same year, while the main imperial palace (大内) was built from 1274 onwards. The design of Dadu followed several rules laid down in the Confucian classic The Rites of Zhou, including "9 vertical and horizontal axes", "palaces in front, markets in back", "ancestral worship to the left, divine worship to the right". It was broad in scale, strict in planning and execution, and complete in equipment. A year after the 1271 establishment of the Yuan dynasty, Kublai Khan proclaimed the city his capital under the name Dadu as it is interpreted capital city in Hanzi and named Khanbaliq as referred in the state diplomatic letters in Mongolian. The construction was not fully completed until 1293. His previous seat at Shangdu (Xanadu) became the summer capital. As part of the Great Khans' policy of religious tolerance, Khanbaliq had various houses of worship. Almost every major religious tradition and sect in China and the wider world had a presence in the city. Orders of rabbi, Taoist sects, Mongol shamans, and various kinds of Hindu religious groups were some of the most well-known religious minorities in the city. Buddhists, Muslims, Church of the East Christians, Catholics, and Confucianists were more common. Confucians and Taoists were extremely well-regarded by most Mongol nobles, and "some of the Mongols' most esteemed advisors were Taoists and Confucians." It even was the seat of a Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Khanbaliq from 1307 until its 1357 suppression. It was restored in 1609 as (then) Diocese of Peking. The Hongwu Emperor of the Ming dynasty sent an army to Dadu in 1368. The last Yuan emperor fled north to Shangdu while the Ming razed the palaces of their capital to the ground. The former capital was renamed Beiping (北平 "Pacified North") and Shuntian Prefecture was established in the area around the city. The Hongwu Emperor was succeeded by his young grandson the Jianwen Emperor. His attempts to rein in the fiefs of his powerful uncles provoked the Jingnan Rebellion and ultimately his usurpation by his uncle, the Prince of Yan. Yan's powerbase lay in Shuntian and he quickly resolved to move his capital north from Yingtian (Nanjing) to the ruins at Beiping. He shortened the northern boundaries of the city and added a new and separately walled southern district. Upon the southern extension of the Taiye Lake (the present Nanhai), the raising of Wansui Hill over Yuan ruins, and the completion of the Forbidden City to its south, he declared the city his northern capital Beijing. With one brief interruption, it has borne the name ever since.