Jinghua City is situated in the middle of Zhejiang Province, it is directly under the jurisdiction of the Province, its name comes from Jinghua Mountain in that area. Neighboring Taizhou in the east, Lishui in the south, Quzhou in the west, Shaoxing and Hangzhou in the north, it covers an area of 10,918 square kilometers, among which 40.8% is mountainous areas, 41.58% is highland and 17.62% is plains. By the end of 1997, there were 180340 hectares of farmland. Jinghua is located in the eastern part of Jingqu Basin, the terrain tilts from the north and south to the middle. “Mountains in three directions and basins scattered with three rivers mixed” reflects the basic features of that area. There is Dapan and Huiji Mountain in the east and northeast, Xianxia Ling Mountain in the south, there is Longmen Mountain and Qianli Mountain in the north and northwest, among which 208 mountains are over 1000 meters. Mountains in the area is mostly between 500-1000 meter, which distributed in south and north side of the area. There are highlands with mild fluctuant scattered in the mountain area. The middle part of the city is situated in the eastern part of Jinqu Basin with Wuyi, Yongkang, Nanma , Pujiang and Duntou Basins decorated within. From the east of Weishan Town of Dongyang City to the west of Youbu Town of Lanxi City, it stretches out for over 100 km with extend of 10 km. Within those basins, there are low hills which altitude is between 50-250 meter and the relative height is less than 100 meter. In the bottom of the basin, there is usually low-lying plains. The upper reaches of Dongyang River flows from the east to west across Yiwu, joined by Wuyi River in Wucheng and then to Jinhua River. Jinhua River flows to the north and joined by Qujiang River in Lanxi and flows to Lan River. Lan River flows to the north to Xinanjiang City in Jiangjunyan. The downtown area of Jinghua is situated in the meeting point of Dongyang River, Wuyi River and Jinghua River and covers an area of 301 square kilometers including 25 square kilometer of satellite towns. It belongs to the sub-tropical monsoon climate with distinct seasons and mild temperature and rich heat and adequate precipitation and with distinct dry and wet seasons. With relatively early spring and a short autumn, long and hot summer and complementary heat and sunshine winter, the basins have own diverse climate and frequent disastrous weather.
During the Qin and Han Dynasty, it belonged to Wushang of Huiji County. Dongyang was started to use as the name in the 1st year of Baoding era of Wu Kingdom of the Three Kingdom Period (266 ), and changed into Jinghua County from the 3rd year of Chentianjia era of Nanchao Dynasty (562). The name was changed into Wuzhou in 593 of Sui Emperor and then changed into Wuzhou Lu in 1276, the name of Jinghua Fu was changed into Wuzhou Lu, and Jinhua Fu in 1360, the name was remained till the end of Qing Dynasty. In the 1st year of the Republic of China (1912), the system of Fu was abolished, province and county system replaced the previous one. Jinghua Dao was established in 1914-1927, with former Quzhou and Yanzhou Fu under its jurisdiction. The administrative Supervision District was set up during the Republic period. On May 7, 1949, the 8th Administrative District of Zhejiang Province was established when Jinghua was liberalized. In October the same year, it changed into Jinghua Special District. Quzhou Special District was abolished and then merged into Jinghaua Special District. Later on, the cities and counties under its jurisdiction has been adjusted from time to time. In April 1968, Jinghua Special District was changed into Jinghua District. In May 1985, Jinghua District was abolished and Jinghua and Quzhou of county level cities were combined into a city, a system of county under municipal jurisdiction came into implementation. Wuchen District was set up within Jinghua City and Jinghua County was set up in rural area. At the same time, Lanxi County was abolished, instead, Lanxi City was established since. In May 1988 and October 1992, Yiwu, Dongyang and Yongkang counties were abolished and a county-level city system was set up. By the end of 1997, there were Wucheng District, Lanxi, Yiwu, Dongyang and Yongkang cities and Jinghua, Wuyi, Pujiang, Pan’an counties under the jurisdiction of Jinghua City. Altogether, there are 109 towns, 82 villages, and 7 neighborhood communities, 5934 administrative villages, 313 neighborhood societies, with a population of 4.4 million of which 331,400 is urban residents.
