A good place to start your Píngyáo experience is the magnificent city walls (城墙; chéng qiáng), which date from 1370. At 10m high and more than 6km in circumference, they are punctuated by 72 watchtowers, each containing a paragraph from Sunzi’s The Art of War .
Part of the southern wall, which collapsed in 2004, has been rebuilt, but the rest is original. Píngyáo’s city gates (城门; chéngmén) are fascinating and are some of the best preserved in China; the Lower West Gate (Fèngyì Mén; Phoenix Appearing Gate) has a section of the original road, deeply grooved with the troughs left by cartwheels (also visible at the South Gate).
