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Puli Town Wikipedia

Puli (甫里) was the ancient name of the water town Luzhi Township (甪直镇).

Luzhi is located in the Wuzhong District, 18 km east of Suzhou, Jiangsu province, China.

This water town was named after a Tang Dynasty recluse poet Lu Guimong (陆龟蒙) who retired in this town. Lu Guimong had a pseudonym: Mr. Pu-li (甫里先生).

At that time, Puli consisted of two districts: Puli and Liuzhi（六直）. Liuzhi meant that there were six straight rivers in town; in Suzhou dialect, "liu" was pronounced as "lu", and 六直 pronounced as Luzhi. At the end of Qing Dynasty, Puli was changed to Luzhi township of Yuanhe County.

Luzhi reputated to be the Venice of the East, famous for its beautiful waterways and ancient bridges, some of the bridges dated back to the Song Dynasty. A walk in ancient town Luzhi is a walk into history frozen in time, tranquil and serene.

The Ming Dynasty poet Gao Qi (高启) poem : "Scene of Puli" is still an accurate description of the scenery in ancient town Luzhi today:

Scene of Puli

Long bridge short bridge with willows

Front stream rear stream with lotus

People watching banner over wine store risen

Seagulls escort boat to home of fishman.

In 2003, the Chinese government published a list of "Ten Famous Chiese Historical Townships". Luzhi is on this list.
In 2004, Luzhi together with Tongli and Zhouzhuang were listed in
the tentative list for UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
With the rapid modernization of China, large number of historical towns
disappeared under the budozers,only a handful of well preserved
historical townships remain today, in 2004, Luzhi was awarded Township Preservation Award
by UNESCO.

Last Modified:   2005-11-10