The Anfeng Pond, known as Quepi, is located 30 km south of Shouxian County in Anhui Province.
Pi, a special kind of irrigation works in ancient China, was a man-made reservoir. The Quepi is said to have been built by the Chu State during spring and autumn some 2,500 years ago. It is the earliest and most well-preserved, large-scale irrigation work in China at present.
Dabie Mountain, which lies on the interface of the Hubei and Hunan provinces, stretches to Anhui Province. Water from the northern slope drops to low-lying land south of Shouxian County, turning into a flooded area during rainy seasons in summer and autumn. Conversely, when there is not enough rain, the area suffers from drought. Serving as the main farming land of the Chu State, the ruler ordered the Quepi be built to store water during rainy seasons to irrigate large areas of land when drought came.
During the 500 years from the warring period to the Han Dynasty (206BC-220 AD), the Quepi gradually became worn down. In the Wei Dynasty (220-265), Cao Cao paid great attention to the renovation of the Quepi to strengthen his power so he could ward off enemy states. But, at that time, the Quepi had been silted up with mud and hardly performed its functions.
The Quepi once played an important role in Chinese history and promoted the economic development and prosperity of the local area. Gradually, it became abandoned, measuring only 20 by 10 li from east to west. After the founding of new China, the reservoir went through large-scale repairs and its storage capacity reached over 73 million cubic meters with an irrigation area of over 42,000 hectares.
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