Dolon Nor
town in Duolun, Inner Mongolia, China
Dolon Nor, also known as Dolonnur and previously as To-lun and Lama-Miao, is a town and the county seat of Duolun County, Xilin Gol League in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous region, China. It is of historical importance because the remnants of Shangdu, the summer capital of Kublai Khan and the following Mongol emperors of the Yuan dynasty (13th and 14th century), are located some 28 kilometers (17 miles) northwest of the modern town. Beginning in the 17th century, the Manchu emperors of the Qing dynasty developed the city as a religious center.
In the 11th edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, the city was described as follows:
The town proper almost exclusively occupied by Chinese, is about a mile in length by half a mile in breadth, has narrow and dirty streets, and contains a population of about 26,000. Unlike the ordinary Chinese town of the same rank, it is not walled. A busy trade is carried on between the Chinese and the Mongolians, who bring in their cattle, sheep, camels, hides and wool to barter for tea, tobacco, cotton and silk. At some distance from the Chinese town lies the Mongolian quarter, with two groups of lama temples and villages occupied by about 2300 priests. Dr Williamson (Journeys in North China, 1870) described the chief temple as a huge oblong building with an interior not unlike a Gothic church. Lamamiao is the seat of a manufactory of bronze idols and other articles of ritual, which find their way to all parts of Mongolia and Tibet. The craftsmen work in their own houses.
The public source identifies “Dolon Nor” as town in Duolun, Inner Mongolia, China. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Dolon, town and Duolun.
Why this record matters
A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Dolon Nor”, the useful work is to connect “town in Duolun, Inner Mongolia, China” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 8, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3494312. Authority coordinates are 42.198, 116.482. None of the 1 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1870.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
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This entry incorporates text from “Dolon Nor” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.