"hutong",H-U-T-O-N-G what does hutong mean?

Another explanation says that during the yuan dynasty,about 13th century,residential areas in the city were divided into many divisions.between the smaller divisions were passageways for people to travel through.and those passageways also functioned as isolation belts against fire risks.in mongolian language,passageways of this kind were called hutong.

but no matter what hutong exactly means,one thing is for sure,that is,hutong first appeared in beijing during the yuan dynasty.in the early 13th century,a mongolian tribe from the north became very strong.led by genghis khan,the mongolian occupied beijing,the capital of jin dynasty.in the year 1271,kubla khan,the grandson of genghis khan,ounded yuan dynasty and set beijing as the capital city in the following year.unfortunately,the old city was completely destroyed during the war.so they had to rebuild it.in old china,all the structures and roads were required to be symmetrical.so the city was well designed. first they had to find a center ,and then built a regular square city.the layout of the city was very much like a chessboard.about 50 residential areas were constructed,with straight roads and hutongs in between.