Tusi Heritage Sites

China's Tusi sites, remains of tribal domains in South and Southwest China whose hereditary rulers were appointed by ancient China's central government as TUSI, was inscribed in the World Heritage List on 4th July, 2015, in Bonn, Germany. The representative sites consist of Yongshun Tusi Site in China's central Hunan Province, Tangya Tusi Site in Hubei Province and Hailongtun Site in Guizhou Province.
Tusi literally means hereditary tribal headmen appointed by Chinese emperors to govern the often unruly ethnic minority regions in the central and western parts of south China, where the specific tribal governance system was adopted from the 13th to the early 20th century.
The ruins of Hailongtun castle in Zunyi, Guizhou Province, are located at the top of a mountain. The fortress was built in 1257 and was burned down in a battle in 1600. The site covers 1.59 square kilometers, and more than 2,000 cultural relics were unearthed in 2012, including porcelain, jade and ink slabs.
The Tangya Tusi City in Xianfeng County in Central China’s Hubei Province was even bigger than the Forbidden City in Beijing. Chieftains there ruled for 460 years. Statues, a cemetery and an ornately decorated memorial archway still stand there.
Yongshun’s old tusi city in Central Hunan Province has a history dating back more than 600 years. Lying on the bank of a river, it is the largest, oldest and best preserved tusi city site in China, with a temple, ancestral house, cemeteries and memorial archway. The complicated sewer ditch network is still working.
In Yongshun, 927 pieces of pottery, 3,686 pieces of porcelain, and 260 pieces of ironware were discovered, together with skeletons of tigers, leopards, bears, wolves, deers, and remains of turtles and shellfish.
China’s first tusi museum was completed in Yongshun, which will open to the public in July 2015.