[citation needed] A part of Zhenjiang was held by Ce, Marquess of Yi, under the early Zhou dynasty.

One Chinese legend relates that the site's fengshui was so advantageous that the First Emperor ordered 3000 prisoners to dig a tunnel through one of its hills to dissipate its qi.

[6] The Sui took the city in AD 581 from Chen and made it an important garrison on the lower Yangtze, the source of its present name ("Protecting the River").

Its importance grew with the construction of the Grand Canal, after which it served as the chief collection and transit center for the grain tax paid by the farmers of the Yangtze delta.

The 11th-century scientist and statesman Shen Kuo composed his 1088 Dream Pool Essays during his retirement in a garden estate on the outskirts of the city.

A decade later, massive floods of the Yellow River altered its course from south to north of Shandong and closed the northern path of the Grand Canal.

[4] The southern part of the Grand Canal was obstructed in the early 20th century,[citation needed] although by that point the city was connected by rail to Shanghai and Nanjing.

During World War II, the city fell to Japan's Shanghai Expeditionary Army in the morning of 8 December 1937,[13] shortly before the capture of Nanjing, but local resistance to the Japanese is still celebrated among the Chinese.

Zhenjiang is still one of China's busiest ports for domestic commerce, serving as a hub for trade among Jiangsu, Anhui, and Shanghai.

The city has a humid subtropical climate (Koppen:Cwa), with a noticeable rise in rainfall during the East Asian monsoon.

Having forgotten about a vat of wine for 21 days, he found it had spoiled but now possessed a pleasant sour taste that could be used to complement foods.

[18] Other local specialties include crab cream bun,[clarification needed] Chinkiang pork (鎭江肴肉, akin to head cheese), and pickled vegetables.

[citation needed] Formerly, households in Zhenjiang would prepare for the new year by eating a red-bean dish and avoiding rice.

One bowl of beans was left on the table to feed the home's flies, from the belief that they would then avoid disturbing the family during the new year festivities.

[19] A natural spring in a park on the edge of Zhenjiang has been famed since the Tang (7th–9th century) as the best in Jiangsu for making tea.

[13] The local Jinshan temple appears in the tale of Madame White Snake and inspired a replica in the Kangxi Emperor's garden at Chengde.

The railway was extended to Beijing after the completion of the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge in 1968, connecting Zhenjiang to China's political and commercial hubs.