According to documents, the area of Dongshi is "the place where the north and the south live". According to archaeological investigation, Dongshi is 1000 meters long from north to south and 24 meters wide from east to west, covering an area of 0.92 square kilometers. Around the city, there are two doors on each side, and there are eight doors in * * *. The width of the north (Chunmingmen Street) of the city wall is120m, and the width of the east, south and west sides is120m. The purpose of this wide street is to facilitate commercial transportation and parking of cars and horses before citizens enter the market.
Dongshi is located in the west of Xi Jiaotong University and north of Xi Railway Bureau, with a street width of nearly 30 meters, which is about 1 times that of Xishi Street. Today, part of the West Campus of Xi Jiaotong University is built on the old site of Dongshi and Shidong Street.
Due to its proximity to three inner cities (Tai Chi Palace in the west, Daming Palace in the east and Xingqing Palace in the south) and the surrounding houses of many royal nobles and dignitaries, Dongcheng is a "gathering of exotic things in all directions" (Chang Dongcheng), and most of the goods on the market are luxury goods to meet the needs of royal nobles and dignitaries.
Like Li Fang, the east and west markets in Chang 'an in Tang Dynasty were surrounded by tall walls. According to the Records of Chang 'an in Song Dynasty, its scale is quite large, each city covers an area of about 2 square meters, there are four streets in the city, and there are two gates on each side of the city wall, which is confirmed by the comprehensive investigation and measurement of the ruins of the two cities. As the most important market in Chang 'an and even the whole country, Xi Shi conducts closed centralized transactions, that is, a number of similar commodities gather together to form a' boss' (or equivalent to a' line' or a' store'). The city has a special management organization-the municipal bureau and the draw. The trading area is also concentrated in a relatively closed place, surrounded by walls and gates.
According to the results of archaeological excavation, the plane of Xishi site is rectangular, with a length of 103 1 m from north to south and a length of 927 meters from east to west, covering an area of 0.96 square kilometers. Its scope is located in the east of Dongtaoyuan, the west of Laomijia Bridge, the north of Dongtaoyuan Bridge, the south of Northwest Branch of China Aviation Equipment Company and the market position of Xianlaonan.
At the time of excavation, there was a rammed earth wall foundation in the north and east of Xi Shi, which was more than 4 meters wide. In the west, there are two equal streets with the width of 16 m in the north-south direction and the east-west direction, and the four streets crisscross into a well shape, which divides the whole city into nine rectangular areas, of which the east-west second street is 327 meters apart and the north-south second street is 309 meters apart. There are ditches on both sides of every street, and sidewalks with a width of 1 meter are found outside the ditches.
The nine areas in the west of the city are surrounded by streets, so that the periphery of each area is facing the street, which is convenient for trading. Every area has alleys that are convenient for internal traffic. Under some alleys, there are culverts built by brick friends, which are connected with ditches on both sides of the street. The ruins of commercial shops unearthed along the street show that the houses are small in scale, 4 to 10 meters wide and more than 3 meters deep, all adjacent to the street; The relative concentration of unearthed similar items also proves the existence of a certain type of shop. For example, jewelry stores have many products such as beads, pearls, agates and crystals, while ironware stores have unearthed a large number of nails, iron bars and small ironware.
The west market is far from Sannei, surrounded by many houses, and the commodities in the market are mostly clothes, candles, cakes, medicines and other daily necessities. The western market is more prosperous than the eastern market, and it is the main industrial and commercial area and economic activity center of Chang 'an, so it is also called the "gold market".
Xi Shi is close to Kaiyuan, the starting point of Chang 'an Silk Road in Tang Dynasty, surrounded by many foreign businessmen, thus becoming an international trade market. There are businessmen from Central Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Korea, Baekje, Silla, Japan and other countries and regions. Among them, the "Hu merchants" in Central Asia, Persia (now Iran) and DaShi (now Arabia) are the most, and most of them live in the western market or some shops near the western market. These foreign businessmen sold the spices and medicines they brought to China bureaucrats, and then bought back jewelry, silk and porcelain from China. Therefore, there are many shops opened by foreign businessmen in the western market, such as Persian mansions, jewelry stores, warehouses, hotels and so on. Among them, Ji Hu Restaurant is visited by teenagers from time to time, and there are many girls from the western regions singing and dancing, serving fine wine. Therefore, in Li Bai's Youth Journey, there are poems of "Five-Ling Youth's Gold Market East" and "Laughing into Ji Hu Restaurant".
The Tang government implemented strict regular trading and night market ban system for Chang 'an market, especially for East and West cities. The gates of the two cities also opened and closed with the gates, street gates and square gates of Chang 'an in the Tang Dynasty in the morning and evening, and were guarded by doormen.