T'AI-HANG MOUNTAINS

Wade-Giles romanization T'ai-hang Shan, Pinyin Taihang Shan, range stretching some 250 miles (400 km) from north to south and forming the provincial boundary between Shansi and Hopeh provinces, China. Sometimes misnamed the T'ai-hsing Range by Western writers, the T'ai-hang forms the boundary between the North China Plain and the Shansi plateau. The T'ai-hang Mountains were formed during the Jurassic mountain-building period. Soils are of the forest brown and cinnamon types. The ranges rise steeply from the North China Plain to a height of approximately 3,3004,000 feet (1,0001,200 m). Hsiao-wu-t'ai, in northwestern Hopeh province, reaches 9,416 feet (2,870 m) above sea level. A spur of the Great Wall extends north-south along the eastern foothills. In the south, in the northwestern part of Honan province, the T'ai-hang Mountains swing to the west to form the southwestern edge of the plateau overlooking the plain of the Huang Ho (Yellow River). The mountains are drained to the east by numerous tributary streams of the Hai River system. Two of these, the Hu-t'o River and the Cho-chang River, break through the main range and drain the interior basins behind the mountains. The Hu-t'o River valley divides the T'ai-hang Mountains proper from the Wu-t'ai Mountains further northwest, which are structurally distinct. The T'ai-hang Mountains throughout history presented a great obstacle to communications between Shansi and Hopeh, and the road over T'ai-hang became a poetic symbol for the frustrations of life. The principal routes were the so-called eight passes of the T'ai-hang, but the most important of these was the pass at Ching-hsing, now followed by the railway from Shih-chia-chuang (Hopeh) to T'ai-yan (Shansi). Along the steep eastern face of the mountains are rich and easily accessible coal seams, which are mined extensively in the area in the south around Han-tan (Hopeh). The western side of the range, facing inward to the Shansi plateau, also has rich coal deposits, which are mined at Yang-ch'uan in the north and Ch'ang-chih in the south.