The mountain is located to the northeast of Erhai and forms the tripoint of three counties: Heqing, Binchuan, and Dali City.

Xu Xiake (1586-1641), a famous traveller and writer of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), marvelled that on the top of a single peak, people could see the "Four Scenes" - sun, lake, cloud and snow.

"[1]The mountain is now not only a center of Zen, Pureland, and Tibetan Buddhism, but also a popular weekend getaway for Chinese tourists.

'Mount Jakang Chen' (Tibetan: རི་བྱ་རྐང་ཅན, Wylie: ri bya rkang can) (alternate names: Riwo Jakang, Mount Jizu, Jizu Shan, Jizushan Mountain) Tan Chung (1998: p. 136) states that: "Among the legends of Yunnan, there is one recorded in the Gazetteer of Yunnan Province compiled during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).

In the reign of the Kangxi Emperor (1662-1722) of the Qing dynasty (1644-1911), there were 42 big or small temples, 65 nunneries and more than 170 abodes for peace, with more than 5,000 monks and nuns.

Monica Esposito (1993: vol2., p. 389-440; 1997: p. 67-123) mentions the 'Longmen' (lóngmén) Tantric branch of Mount Jizu a regional example of the tradition that yielded the Longmen Grottoes.