Sicheng the lost city of China

The city is also called the Lion City because of the Five Lion Mountain (Wun Shi in Mandarin) behind it, the city of Sicheng was found approximately 1300 years ago during the Tang Dynasty (25-200 AD) in today’s Zhejiang Province, 400 km south of Shanghai. It was a political and economic hub of the Ming and Qing dynasties. In 1959, the city was deliberately flooded to make way for a hydro-electric project and the Xin’an dam. More than 300,000 residents, who had lived there for generations, were evacuated to create the artificial Qiandao Lake.

The man-made lake covers an area of 573 square km (221 square miles) and is dotted with thousands of islands big and small. Forests cover more than 80% of the surface area. The city itself has been remarkably well-preserved 85 to 131 feet under the lake, depending on one’s location. The ancient stone buildings with their Chinese inscriptions stand intact along the main avenues and streets just like it did almost sixty years ago. Even the wooden beams and staircases are intact. The water actually protects the various components of the city from the sun, wind and rain.