Migrating geese flying south from Siberia each winter were once thought to travel no further than Hengyang before turning back north come spring, stopping instead at a modest 97-metre peak on the edge of the city that still carries their name.
相传每年冬天,从西伯利亚南飞的大雁,只会飞抵衡阳便不再南下,待到来年开春便折返北归,途中只在城边一座海拔仅九十七米的山峰稍作停留,这座山峰至今仍以雁为名。
Huiyan Peak, meaning Return-Goose Peak, has carried a temple on its summit for more than 1,500 years, and the Tang dynasty poet Du Fu wrote of the geese completing their journey there and heading home again; the city itself has long been nicknamed Wild Goose City as a result.
回雁峰之名意为”雁归之峰”,峰顶古寺已矗立逾一千五百年;唐代诗人杜甫曾写下大雁抵此便即北返的诗句;这座城市也因此长期被称为”雁城”。
Ornithologists today know Siberian geese in fact continue much further south, wintering as far away as Guangdong and northern Vietnam, but the legend has outlasted the correction; the peak, the temple and the nickname all remain exactly where they were.
如今的鸟类学家已经知道,西伯利亚南飞的大雁,实际上会继续南下,远至广东乃至越南北部越冬;然而这一传说,却比这项更正的事实流传得更久——这座山峰、山上的古寺,以及这座城市的别称,至今依旧未变。
Forty-Seven Days that Helped Bring Down a Japanese Cabinet
四十七天,拖垮了一届日本内阁
Centuries later, Hengyang became the site of what Chinese and Japanese sources alike have called the Oriental Moscow, when General Fang Xianjue’s 10th Army, numbering some 18,000 men, held the city for 47 days in the summer of 1944 against a Japanese force of more than 110,000.
数个世纪之后,衡阳成为了中日双方史料中都曾称之为”东方莫斯科保卫战”的战场;一九四四年夏,方先觉将军所率的第十军,兵力约一万八千人,在此坚守四十七天,抵御着十一万余人的日军攻势。
According to China Daily’s account of the released wartime archives, Japanese casualties at Hengyang approached 30,000, nearly half of all losses suffered during that stage of the broader Japanese offensive, and the prolonged siege helped hasten the resignation of Prime Minister Hideki Tojo’s cabinet on 18 July 1944, weeks before the city itself finally fell.
据《中国日报》援引解密战时档案的报道,日军在衡阳一役中伤亡人数逼近三万,几乎占据整场攻势同期损失的近半;这场旷日持久的围城战,也促使日本首相东条英机内阁于一九四四年七月十八日提前总辞,而此时距衡阳城真正陷落尚有数周之久。
A Population Shrinking Faster than the GDP Is Growing
一个人口萎缩速度快于GDP增速的城市
According to the city’s own 2024 economic communiqué, Hengyang’s GDP reached ¥449.2 billion that year, up 5.4 percent, with per capita output at ¥69,470; the permanent population stood at 6.4343 million, down 62,700 on the year before.
据该市自身发布的二零二四年经济统计公报显示,当年衡阳市GDP达四千四百九十一点六九亿元,同比增长百分之五点四,人均产值为六万九千四百七十元;常住人口为六百四十三点四三万人,较上年减少六点二七万人。
Getting to Hengyang means a high-speed rail journey of around ninety minutes from Changsha, on lines that also run south towards Guangzhou, or a short flight into Hengyang Nanyue Airport, which serves domestic routes across the country.
前往衡阳,可乘坐高铁,从长沙出发车程约九十分钟,该线路继续向南可通往广州;也可乘飞机抵达衡阳南岳机场,该机场开通了通往全国各地的国内航线。
Huiyan Peak still stands above the Xiang River today, and the geese, whatever their actual destination, still pass over it every winter on schedule.
回雁峰至今仍矗立于湘江之畔,而无论那些大雁实际飞往何处,它们每年冬天,依旧会准时从峰顶上空飞过。
