Early history Kunming long profited from its position on the caravan route through to
South Asia and
Southeast Asia. Early townships on the southern edge of
Lake Dian (outside the contemporary city perimeter) can be dated back to 279 BC, although they have been long lost to history. Early settlements in the area around Lake Dian date back to
Neolithic times. The
Dian Kingdom, whose original language likely belonged to the
Tibeto-Burman languages, was also established near the area. Dian was ruled by the Chinese
Han dynasty under the reign of
Emperor Wu of Han in 109 BC. The Han dynasty incorporated the territory of the Dian into their
Yizhou Commandery, but left the ruler of Dian with the title. The Han dynasty (205 BC–AD 220), seeking control over the
Southern Silk Road running to Burma,
Pakistan and India, brought small parts of Yunnan into China's orbit, but subsequent dynasties could do little to tame what was then a remote and wild borderland until the 13th century. During the
Sui dynasty (581–618), two military expeditions were launched against the area, and it was renamed
Kunzhou in Chinese sources.
Medieval China Founded in 765, Kunming was known to the ancient Chinese as
Tuodong () city in the
Kingdom of Nanzhao (737–902) during the 8th and 9th centuries. The Confucian temple, doubling as a school, was the first of its kind in Yunnan, attracting students from minority groups across the province. Coupled with his promotion of Confucian ceremonies and customs, Shams al-Din has been largely credited with the
sinicization of the region. The city grew as a trading center between the southwest and the rest of China. It is considered by scholars to have been the city of
Yachi Fu (鸭池府) where people had used
cowries as cash and ate their meat raw, as described by the 13th-century Venetian traveler
Marco Polo. The area was first dubbed Kunming during the decline of the Yuan dynasty.
Ming and Qing Dynasties " from
Du Halde's 1736
Description of China, based on reports from
Jesuit missionaries In the 14th century, Kunming was retaken from Mongolian officials when the Ming dynasty defeated the Yuan dynasty. The Ming later built a
wall surrounding present-day Kunming. 300 years later, Ming turncoat
Wu Sangui held the city as a Qing governor. During the beginning of Wu's rule, the entirety of Yunnan and Guizhou were ruled from Kunming by Wu. During the
Revolt of the Three Feudatories, the seat of Wu's newly declared Zhou dynasty was moved to
Hengzhou in
Hunan. Later in 1678, when Wu died, his grandson
Wu Shifan resisted Qing forces for two more months before committing suicide, reverting control of the city back into Qing hands. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, it was the seat of the
superior prefecture of Yunnan. In 1832, the beginnings of a real city were acknowledged within the city walls and there were significant structures within their confines. The founding of the city can therefore be said to have been a predominantly 19th century affair. It was also in this century that the city grew to become the major market and transport centre for the region. Many of the city's inhabitants were displaced as a result of the
1833 Kunming earthquake. The rebel leader
Du Wenxiu, the Muslim Han ruler of
Dali, attacked and besieged the city several times between 1858 and 1868. A great part of the city's wealth did not survive the 1856
Panthay Rebellion, when most of the Buddhist sites in the capital were badly damaged, converted to mosques, or were razed. Decades later, Kunming began to be influenced by the West, especially from the
French Empire. In the late 1800s, the French started to build the
Kunming-Haiphong railway between Kunming and
Haiphong in what was then
French Indochina. In the 1890s, an uprising against working conditions on the Kunming–Haiphong rail line saw many laborers executed after France shipped in weapons to suppress the revolt. The meter-gauge rail line, only completed by around 1911, was designed by the French so that they could tap into Yunnan's mineral resources for their colonies in Indochina. Kunming was a
communications center during this time and a junction of two major trading routes, one westward via
Dali and
Tengchong County into
Myanmar, the other southward through
Mengzi County to the
Red River in
Indochina. Eastward, a difficult mountain route led to
Guiyang in Guizhou province and thence to
Hunan province. To the northeast was a well-established trade trail to
Yibin in Sichuan province on the
Yangtze River. But these trails were all extremely difficult, passable only by mule trains or pack-carrying porters.
Republic The opening of the Kunming area began in earnest with the completion in 1906–1910 of the
Kunming-Haiphong Railway to
Haiphong in north
Vietnam (part of
French Indochina). Kunming became a
treaty port opening to foreign trade in 1908 and became a commercial center soon after. government.
Second World War (1937–1945) Kunming was transformed into a modern city as a result of war
refugees of
World War II fleeing from the north and eastern coastal regions of China to move to Kunming, bringing much commerce and industry into the southwest of China, including Kunming. They carried dismantled industrial plants with them, which were then re-erected beyond the range of Japanese bombers. In addition, a number of
universities and institutes of higher education were evacuated there. The increased trade and expertise quickly established Kunming as an industrial and manufacturing base for the wartime government in
Chongqing. As the battles of Shanghai, Taiyuan and
Nanjing were lost by the end of 1937, and with
Wuhan falling into Japanese occupation by the end of 1938, many more of China's military forces and civilians retreated to cities outside the reach of the Japanese military ground forces a year prior to the outbreak of the
Second World War in Europe in 1939, including the relocation of the
Chinese Air Force Academy from
Jianqiao Airbase to Kunming's
Wujiaba Airbase, where the airfield was vastly expanded, becoming the new training hub for the battered but regrouped
Chinese Air Force in which Lieutenant General
Claire Lee Chennault took command of cadet training duties in the summer of 1938. The Chinese Air Force command established the 41st Pursuit Squadron based in Kunming, also known as the French Volunteer Group squadron in June 1938, and with them they brought
Dewoitine D.510 fighters, with the intention of securing the sale of the planes to the Chinese Air Force; the French participated in some combat engagements against Japanese raids, including dogfights against
Mitsubishi A5M fighters with Chinese
Hawk III fighters over
Nanchang, but after several setbacks, including a fighter pilot
KIA, the group was disbanded in October 1938. Although Japan was focused on ending Chinese resistance at the
Battle of Chongqing and Chengdu, Kunming was not out of the reach of Japanese air raids, facing attacks by
IJAAF and
IJNAF bombers. Chinese military assets and infrastructure were under regular attack, while the
RoCAF 18th Fighter Squadron and units of the Air Force Academy at Wujiaba were tasked with aerial defense of Kunming. The city of Kunming was prepared as an alternate
National Redoubt in case the temporary capital in
Chongqing fell, with an elaborate system of caves to serve as offices, barracks and factories, but it was never utilised. Kunming was to have served again in this role during the ensuing
Chinese Civil War, but the
Nationalist garrison there switched sides and joined the
Communists. Instead,
Taiwan would become the last redoubt and home of the Republic of China government, a role it fulfills to this day. When the city of
Nanning fell to the Japanese during the
Battle of South Guangxi, China's sea-access was cut off. However, the Chinese victory at the
Battle of Kunlun Pass kept the Burma Road open. When the Japanese began occupying
French Indochina in 1940, the Burma Road that linked Kunming and the outside-world with unoccupied China grew increasingly vital as much of the essential support and materials were imported through
Burma. After the
attack on Pearl Harbor, and the start of the
Pacific War in December 1941, Kunming acted as an Allied military command center, which grouped the Chinese, American, British and French forces together for operations in Southeast Asia. Kunming became the northern and easternmost terminus of the vital war-supply line into China known as "
The Hump", which stretched over the Himalayas from British bases in India to port-of-entry Kunming. The
Office of Strategic Services' Service Unit
Detachment 101 (predecessor to the
1st Special Forces Group) was also headquartered in Kunming. Its mission was to divert and disrupt Japanese combat operations in Burma. Kunming, the northern terminus of all three of the Burma Road, the
Ledo Road, and "
The Hump" supply-line, was increasingly targeted by the IJAAF. When the Burma Road was lost to the Japanese, the Hump became China's primary lifeline to the outside world. The 1st American Volunteer Group, known as the "
Flying Tigers", was based in Kunming and tasked with defense of The Hump supply-line against Japanese aerial interceptions. Industry became important in Kunming as the large state-owned
Central Machine Works was transferred there from
Hunan, while the manufacture of electrical products, copper, cement, steel, paper, and textiles expanded.
After World War II Until 1952, Kunming was a walled city. The city government in 1952 ordered hundreds of young people to tear down the wall and use its bricks to make a new road running north–south. To show its appreciation for the young people that demolished the east wall, the city government named the new street, Qingnian Lu, after them. The existence of the walls still echoes today at place names like the district of Xiaoximen () and Beimen Jie (). There are also less obvious connections to the wall, such as Qingnian Lu (), in the location of Kunming's east wall. After 1949, Kunming developed rapidly into an
industrial metropolis with the construction of large iron and steel and chemical complexes, advancing simultaneously with other cities in
Southwestern China. A
Minorities' Institute was set up in the 1950s to promote mutual understanding and access to university education among Yunnan's multiethnic population. The city consolidated its position as a supply depot during the
Vietnam War and subsequent
border clashes with the Vietnamese. Until Mao Zedong's death, in much of the rest of the country Kunming was still generally thought as a remote frontier settlement. Accordingly, the government utilized Kunming as a place where to exile people who had fallen politically out of favor, especially during the
Cultural Revolution. In 1957, Kunming's rail link to Haiphong and Hanoi was re-opened (after being cut during World War II). It was cut again in 1979 and re-opened again in 1996. Since the
economic reforms of the mid-1980s, Kunming has enjoyed increased
tourism and
foreign investment. Several
Thai Chinese banks have offices in Kunming, for example,
Kasikorn Bank and
Krung Thai Bank.
Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn of Thailand has visited Kunming many times to study Chinese culture and promote friendly relations. In the 1980s and 1990s, the city center was rebuilt, with Swiss help, in its current 'modern' style to impress visitors attending the
1999 World Horticultural Exposition. It was primarily during 1997 and 1998 that much of the city's roads, bridges and high rises were built. Today the after-effects of the Expo are apparent in more than just the physical improvements to the city—it was the Expo that made the outside world take notice of Kunming, which was relatively unknown at the time. In July 2005, the second
Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) Summit was held in Kunming, with government leaders from China, Laos, Myanmar (Burma), Thailand, Cambodia, and Vietnam participating. There, China agreed to lend its neighbors more than $1 billion for a series of projects. China promoted GMS cooperation as a first step toward building an eventual China-
ASEAN Free Trade Area.
Bus bombings occurred on 21 July 2008 when explosions aboard two public buses in downtown Kunming killing 2 people. Infrastructure improvements were underway to improve links between Kunming and Southeast Asia in time for the 2010 establishment of the China-ASEAN Free Trade Area. The FTA made Kunming a trade and financial center for Southeast Asia. In addition to physical improvements to enhance Kunming's trade with Southeast Asia, the central and provincial governments have made financial preparations to assist the city's emergence. In July 2006, talks at the
ASEAN Regional Forum, China, Bangladesh and Myanmar (Burma) agreed to construct a highway from Kunming to
Chittagong through
Mandalay for trade and development. On 1 March 2014, 29 people were killed, and more than 130 were injured at Kunming Railway Station in
a terrorist attack. == Geography ==