Yumen Pass

Yumen Pass
The ruin of the Small Fangpan Castle at Yumen Pass
Location80 km (50 mi) NW of Dunhuang, Gansu, China
Coordinates40°21′12.6″N 93°51′50.5″E / 40.353500°N 93.864028°E / 40.353500; 93.864028
Yumen Pass
Simplified Chinese玉门关
Traditional Chinese玉門關
Literal meaningJade Gate
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinYùmén Guān

Yumen Pass (simplified Chinese: 玉门; traditional Chinese: 玉門; pinyin: Yùmén Guān; Uyghur: قاش قوۋۇق, Qash Qowuq), or Jade Gate or Pass of the Jade Gate, is the name of a pass of the Great Wall located west of Dunhuang in today's Gansu Province of China. During the Han dynasty (202 BC – AD 220), this was a pass through which the Silk Road passed, and was the one road connecting Central Asia with East Asia (China), the former called the Western Regions. Just to the south was the Yangguan pass, which was also an important point on the Silk Road. These passes, along with other sites along the Silk Road, were inscribed in 2014 on the UNESCO World Heritage List as the Silk Roads: the Routes Network of Chang'an-Tianshan Corridor World Heritage Site. The pass is at an elevation of 1400 meters.