Bystreet is an old style city alleyway only in Beijing [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]. The word"hutong" came from Mongolian, which means back street alleyway. Most of these bystreets are formed in the 13 century, and has experienced several centuries' development up to now.
Bystreets in Beijing have fascinations to attract tourists. They mainly have an east and west direction with a breadth no longer than 9 miters. The narrowest one is Qianshi bystreet, located in the front gate area. It has the breadth of only 0.7 miters and it's said that some fat people have to hold their breath so that they can go through it.
In Beijing, there are thousands of bystreets and they are surrounding the Forbidden City [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]. Most of them are formed in the Yuan dynasty, the Ming dynasty, and the Qing dynasty. In the ancient time, Beijing has a very strict layout for its city shaping, as a consequence, all the over 7000 bystreets in Beijing are very straight and are as many as stars in the sky.
Besides, there are many kinds of names for them, now the bystreets in Beijing have about 4000 names. And people named the bystreets in many different ways, such as named by some prominent symbol in this bystreet, by the name of place where it located, by the plants it has, or by the direction it goes through. People also use the Beijing idiom and some lucky words as the names as well.
Tips:
1. The best way to visit Hutong is to take a Beijing local pedicab or just take a walk.
2. One shining point for visiting is Back Sea, a blend of ancient Chinese culture and modern western culture.
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