Lijiang Ancient City sits 2400 meters above sea level at the foot of Yulong Mountain in the northwest of Yunnan Province and covers an area of 3.8 square kilometers. It was originally built at the end of Song Dynasty or at the beginning of Yuan Dynasty, more than 800 years ago. The city used to be the post of appointed officers and government office in Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasty.Since Lijiang is located in the traffic transition of Yunnan, Sichuan and Tibet, it plays an important role in the culture exchange among Han nationality and Tibetan, Bai, Naxi nationality. It is also a strategic military fort in the Silk Road and "Ancient Tea and Horse Path."

Due to the long term culture communication and historical accumulation, Lijiang Ancient City owns three world heritages which are quite scare in the world: Lijiang Ancient Town---World Cultural Heritage, "Three Rivers Flow into One"---World Natural Heritage, Dongba Literature and Document---World Memory Heritage. In Dec. 4, 1997, it was put into the list of World Heritage List by the World Cultural Heritage Commission of the UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization).

Most architecture in Lijiang Ancient Town is still preserved as they were in Ming and Qing Dynasty. Most houses are built with two or three storey, according to the physical features of the town. Neighboring Elephant Hill, Golden Rainbow Hill in the north, Monkey Hill in the west, the ancient town naturally runs into vast open space and harmoniously coexists with its surroundings. Avenues and lanes plus Naxi ethnic lodgment in the town are distributed freely along the rivers, trees and dotted with more than 300 antique stone bridges, thus reputed as "Eastern Venice"

Besides Han, Bai, Tibetan, Yi and Pumi nationalities, Naxi ethic group take up 60 percent of the total residents. Walking everywhere in the street of Lijiang ancient town, you can hear Naxi ancient music which was originated from the middle and lower reaches of Yellow River in Tang and Song Dynasty. Till now there are 22 musicals created by Naxi people. Such music is regarded as "the sound from heaven" by many music fans and scholars home and abroad. From 1995 till now, the performance of Naxi ancient music has gained highly evaluation in England, Norway, France, Belgium, America, Sweden and other countries.

Naxi ethic group create brilliant Dongba Culture enjoying nearly one thousand years history. Dongba, absorbing the features of other religions, is the original belief of Naxi nationality. Dongba literature is "the only pictograph still alive" for it can vividly express people's emotions and describe complicated matters by just only 1400 single words. Almost 20 thousand scripts in Naxi pictograph are preserved, covering philosophy, history, astronomy, religion, medicine, folk culture, literature, art and so on, thus called "encyclopaedia of ancient Naxi society".