China has a vast territory and many place names, from a province to a town, and its place names have their own historical origins. For example, during the Qing Dynasty, Jiangnan Province was divided into two, taking the first characters of Jiangning Province, Suzhou Province, Anqing Province and Huizhou Province within its territory, which became the place names of "Jiangsu" and "Anhui" provinces that are still used today. The prefecture-level cities of Xuzhou and Jingzhou are directly following the ancient state names. The names of the smaller counties, such as Zigui County in Yichang, Hubei Province, are because "Qu Yuan's original sister, Wen Yuan's exile, also came to return, because the name of the sister returned". There is a small town in Jingzhou City called "Huang Xie", which is named after One of the "Four Princes of the Warring States", Chunshen Jun Huang Xie.
It can be seen that most of the place names in various parts of China, large or small, can be traced back to their historical origins, whether it is a specific person or a certain historical event. Among them, like Chunshen Jun Huang Xie, there are very few place names that can directly become the place names used by later generations, and with the improvement of administrative ranks, it is even rarer that they can be named by high administrative districts. However, in ancient times, there was a Taoist monk, and later dynasties set up prefectures and counties in his name, and the prefecture-level city named after him still exists. Who is this Daoist monk's surname, and what contribution did he make to be so highly regarded by later dynasties? The influence in the field of administrative district naming is so great that it has not been able to surpass it for more than two thousand years.
This Daoist monk' name was Pan Maoming, and he was a Daoist monk of the Danding Sect during the Two Jin Dynasties. As a religion that originated in China, Taoism has many schools within it, and the Danding school is only one of them. The Danding School is also known as "Jindan Taoism", and the settings such as the alchemy furnace and the elixir of Taishang Laojun in Journey to the West are derived from the Danding Sect. The ultimate pursuit of the Danding sect's alchemy is to achieve the realm of "immortality", and the elixir is refined from lead mercury and other minerals. In ancient times, there were not a few emperors who caused lead mercury poisoning due to taking Dan medicine, and the most representative was Tang Taizong Li Shimin. Although from the point of view of modern science, the Danding school's monastic claims are indeed less scientific.
However, during the two Jin Dynasties when celebrities were competing to take The Five Stones, Pan Maoming refined his own Elixir. The Taiping Huanyu Chronicle says: "Pan Maoming's alchemy of water, the taste is very fragrant, Sencha tried, and different from the waters." In addition, Pan Maoming traveled through the landscape and was charitable, and he was well versed in medicine, and he treated many epidemics in the backward Lingnan region at that time. Therefore, the respect and worship of Pan Maoming by the ancestors of western Guangdong has gradually become mythological from the secular, and the western Guangdong region still respects him as "Pan Xian". In the eighteenth year of the kai emperor (598), Emperor Wen of Sui specially established Maoming County in order to commemorate the contributions made by Pan Maoming to the people of western Guangdong.
In the sixth year of Zhenguan (632), the Tang Dynasty changed GaoZhou to Nandao Prefecture, and two years later changed Nandao Prefecture to Pan Prefecture with the surname of Pan Mao. Under the joint efforts of the government and the public, the story of Pan Maoming was gradually deified, and the "Chronicle of Gaozhou Fu" compiled during the Ming Dynasty's Wanli Dynasty even recorded that "in Jin Yongjia, there are Pan Maoming... Granted the Huang Jing Immortal Fang, he ascended to the East Mountain Alchemy. Since the establishment of a county in the Sui Dynasty, "Maoming" has also been renamed in more than a thousand years, but it has been changed back to "Maoming" in the end. It was not until 1975 that Maoming County, which had existed for thousands of years, was officially upgraded to a prefecture-level city, which is now Maoming City in Guangdong Province, which is also the only prefecture-level city in China named after the Taoist priest.
Maoming City is located on the coast of the South China Sea, and is located south of the Tropic of Cancer, the superior geographical location and climatic conditions, so the local precipitation is abundant and there is no severe cold invasion, so Maoming has been smooth for thousands of years. In the traditional farming era, the production activities of the maoming people were generally relatively smooth. After that, Maoming relied on the advantages of coastal location to enjoy the economic growth brought about by reform and opening up, and the output value of tourism alone could reach a volume of tens of billions. So far, Maoming's regional GDP has long ranked first in western Guangdong, and it is still developing at a high speed and steadily every year. To this day, the people of Maoming have not forgotten Pan Maoming's contributions and influences, and commemorated Pan Maoming in various forms.