[
    {
        "id": 214622,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1999",
        "page_number": 37,
        "title": "RAS-1999",
        "content_text": "# ARTICLES\n\n# BESIDE THE YAMEN: NGA TSIN WAI VILLAGE\n\n# P.H. HASE\n\n## Topography and Early History of the Area\n\nThe north-east part of the Kowloon Peninsula was, before it became developed as part of the City, a broad flat plain, well watered by a series of streams coming down from the hills, and generally fertile. The coastline (running close to today's Prince Edward Road) was fronted by shallow water, with substantial areas of tidal marsh and mud flats offshore. The area was closed in by hills on all sides except that facing the sea: these hills were high and steep to the north and east, more broken and lower to the west and south, but everywhere formed a clear boundary to the area (see Map 1).\n\nThe first settlement of Han Chinese in this plain probably dates from the early second century BC. During this period (206-111 BC), the Kwangtung area formed a separate Empire, that of the Nanyueh (南越), centred on Canton. It is known that the Nanyueh Emperors established a Salt Monopoly within their Empire, and it is very likely (although there are no contemporary written records to substantiate this) that a Salt Sub-Intendancy office was founded at Kowloon City shortly after 200 BC, to supervise salt-fields established along the shores of Kowloon Bay and in Mirs Bay, supervised by a Salt Intendant whose office was probably at Nam Tau (Nantou, 南頭), just outside the area of today's New Territories, on Deep Bay2. The Salt Intendants and their subordinates all had garrisons of soldiers, to stop salt-smuggling, and Kowloon City would have become a military post from the date that it became a Salt Monopoly centre. The great tomb at Lei Cheng Uk, which dates to the Nanyueh period, is certainly that of a senior Nanyueh official, and the only senior officials of the Nanyueh at all likely to have been stationed in the Kowloon City area at that date would have been salt officials supervising salt-fields in the Kowloon City area.\n\nWhile there is no specific documentary evidence of salt-working in the Kowloon City area as early as the Nanyueh, a record from AD 265 specifically mentions salt-officials active in the general area east",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 214623,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1999",
        "page_number": 38,
        "title": "RAS-1999",
        "content_text": "2\n\nof the lower Pearl River Estuary. By AD 331, when the County of Tung Kuan was established, the then Salt Intendant certainly had his yamen (official residence and office) at Nam Tau. Nam Tau became the new county seat in that year, and the then Salt Intendant was promoted to County Magistrate, and the old Salt Monopoly yamen was upgraded to become the new County Magistrate's yamen, with a new yamen thereafter built for the incoming Salt Intendant. These early references also do not speak of Kowloon City specifically, but it is very likely that, with the Salt Intendancy headquarters so close, the salt-fields at Kowloon City were already then in full operation, probably with a Sub-Intendant in charge there, and it is likely that this was so from Nanyueh times.\n\nAt some date between 331 and 1163 the Tung Kuan Salt Intendancy at Nam Tau was split into four, with one of the new Salt Intendants stationed at Kowloon City (then called Kwun Fu Cheung, \"Rich Official Salt-fields\"). The most likely period for this development (which was associated with an attempt to increase revenue from the Salt Monopoly in Kwangtung) is the tenth century, when again Kwangtung formed a separate Empire, that of the Nanhan (907-979); considerable amounts of Nanhan pottery have been found in the general Kowloon City area, suggesting that this was a place of some significance then. By the date of this split of the Salt Intendancy there can be no doubt that Kowloon City was an important Salt Monopoly centre. In 1163 the Kwun Fu Cheung Salt Intendancy yamen was moved to Tip Fuk (Tiefu) on Mirs Bay, where it stayed for a few decades — perhaps a hundred years — before returning to Kowloon City.\n\nIn or shortly before 1293, the Kwun Fu Salt Intendancy was amalgamated with the Salt Intendancy headquartered at Wong Tin outside Sai Heung (Xixiang), a little to the north of Nam Tau, and the old Kowloon City Salt Intendant's yamen (which was a walled compound) became the yamen for a new County Sub-Magistracy then formed. This Sub-Magistracy was upgraded in 1370, and moved to Chek Mei Village outside Sham Chun (Shenzhen) in that year; it was moved back to Kowloon City in 1841, together with the yamen of the local Military Commander, which had previously been at Tai Pang (Dapeng) on Mirs Bay, to bring the Sub-Magistrate and Commander closer to the anticipated problems arising from the British occupation of Hong Kong. The walls of Kowloon City, which",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1999.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/s178b887x",
        "rank": 0
    }
]