Map of the Three Kingdoms
Every place is a real ancient battlefield or city; the dashed blocks are the domains of Wei, Shu, and Wu. Thin grey lines and small labels mark today’s provincial borders and capitals for comparison. Tap a marker for the story, tap the legend to filter storylines.
☜ Tap a marker and its story appears here.
The Yellow Turban Prologue
Dong Zhuo and Chang’an
The Warlords Contend
Guandu and the Unified North
Jingxiang and Red Cliffs
The Shu Han Base
Jiangdong and the Loss of Jing Province
The domains are schematic blocks of the three-way division (c. 220–263), not precise historical borders — the frontiers shifted throughout the near-century, and what is drawn here is the rough shape. Place names are approximate ancient-to-modern locations, and the exact site of some ancient cities is still debated by scholars (such as whether "Longzhong" belongs to Nanyang or Xiangyang). Coastline, modern provincial borders, and cities are from Natural Earth; historical sites use standard scholarly identifications.
Places on this map
Julu
Zhang Jiao’s home and the cradle of the Way of Great Peace. In 184 he cried here "the Blue Heaven is dead, the Yellow Heaven shall rise" and rose in arms in yellow turbans, launching the Yellow Turban Rebellion that ended the Eastern Han’s golden age.
Connected figures: Zhang Jiao
Yingchuan
Here Huangfu Song broke Bo Cai’s Yellow Turban force with fire — the crucial battle of the suppression, and the start of his breaking of one Yellow Turban army after another.
Connected figures: Huangfu Song · Zhang Jiao
Luoyang
Capital of the Eastern Han. After He Jin summoned Dong Zhuo and was killed first by the eunuchs, Dong Zhuo seized the chaos to control the city and depose and install emperors; as the coalition closed in, he dragged Emperor Xian west and burned this centuries-old capital to scorched earth on leaving.
Connected figures: Dong Zhuo · He Jin · Emperor Xian of Han
Chang’an
Dong Zhuo dragged Emperor Xian here and went on dominating the court. Minister Wang Yun laid the chain-link scheme here to kill Dong Zhuo by Lü Bu’s hand; Dong Zhuo’s old officers Li Jue and Guo Si then took Chang’an in revenge, and Wang Yun died as it fell.
Hulao Pass
A key pass in the eastern coalition’s campaign against Dong Zhuo, and the setting of the novel’s "three heroes duel Lü Bu" scene (absent from the histories, though there are records of coalition and Dong Zhuo forces clashing near Hulao Pass).
Xiapi
Lü Bu’s last stronghold. After a long siege by Cao Cao his officers turned coat and opened the gates; Lü Bu was bound to the White Gate Tower and executed, and his strategist Chen Gong refused surrender and went composedly to his death — the legend of the slave of three surnames ends here.
Xu Province
Tao Qian’s seat. When Cao Cao bathed Xu province in blood over his father Cao Song’s murder, Tao Qian sought Liu Bei’s aid and, feeling old and weak, three times sincerely yielded Xu province to him — a rare peaceful transfer of power in a chaotic age.
Xuchang
Cao Cao brought the exiled Emperor Xian here to make his capital, and ever after "held the emperor to command the lords," ruling the realm in the court’s name — making Xuchang the Eastern Han’s nominal last capital.
Connected figures: Cao Cao · Emperor Xian of Han · Xun Yu
Guandu
Where Cao Cao and Yuan Shao fought their decisive battle. Cao Cao’s surprise on Yuan Shao’s granary at Wuchao burned his supplies to ash and collapsed his hundred thousand troops — the battle that laid the foundation for Cao Cao’s unification of the north, a classic of the few defeating the many.
Connected figures: Cao Cao · Yuan Shao · Tian Feng · Ju Shou
Ye
Yuan Shao’s base while he ruled Hebei; after the defeat at Guandu he withdrew here and died disheartened, and his sons’ infighting over the succession quickly collapsed the Hebei base. After Cao Cao took it, it became for a time one of Wei’s political centers.
Baima
Where the "Battle of Baima," a prelude to Guandu, was fought. Guan Yu, temporarily attached to Cao’s camp, charged his horse into the host and cut down Yuan Shao’s fierce general Yan Liang amid ten thousand troops — a real feat of Guan Yu’s, clearly recorded in the histories.
Longzhong
Where Zhuge Liang farmed in seclusion. Here Liu Bei made three visits to draw out the strategist who would shape the next thirty years of the realm, and won the Longzhong Plan.
Connected figures: Zhuge Liang · Liu Bei
Xiangyang
The center of Liu Biao’s rule over Jing province, and an important refuge for northern gentry moving south; Zhuge Liang, Pang Tong, and others studied and traveled in this region.
Connected figures: Liu Biao · Zhuge Liang
Jing Province (Jiangling)
The seat of Jing province, which after Red Cliffs became a strategic prize fought over again and again by the Sun and Liu houses. Guan Yu held it for years, until it fell to Sun Quan’s crossing in white — "losing Jing province to carelessness" is about this place.
Red Cliffs
Where the allied Sun–Liu forces burned away Cao Cao’s last chance to unify the realm. Zhou Yu and Huang Gai staged a flesh-wound ruse and, on the southeast wind, set fire to Cao’s chained fleet, setting the shape of nearly a century of three-way division.
Connected figures: Zhou Yu · Cao Cao · Sun Quan · Zhuge Liang
Chaisang
Sun Quan’s station, where the choice of war or surrender before Red Cliffs was settled — Sun Quan hacked his desk: "anyone who speaks again of surrender, let him be as this desk." Zhou Yu’s grand commander’s headquarters was here too.
Chengdu
Capital of Shu Han. Liu Bei made it his capital after taking Yi province from Liu Zhang, and two generations — Zhuge Liang and Jiang Wei — planned their northern campaigns here, until Liu Shan opened the gates and surrendered here in 263 and Shu Han fell.
Connected figures: Liu Bei · Liu Zhang · Zhuge Liang · Liu Shan
Hanzhong
A strategic prize fought over again and again by Liu Bei and Cao Cao; after taking it Liu Bei declared himself King of Hanzhong. It then became a key supply base and staging route for the northern campaigns of Zhuge Liang and Jiang Wei.
Connected figures: Liu Bei · Cao Cao · Zhuge Liang
Mount Dingjun
The decisive battlefield of the Hanzhong campaign. Huang Zhong, on Fa Zheng’s plan, charged down from the heights and cut down the Wei general Xiahou Yuan, making his name and reaching the peak of his military career past sixty.
Connected figures: Huang Zhong · Fa Zheng
Baidicheng
After the defeat at Yiling, Liu Bei fell back here and never rose again, entrusting his son Liu Shan and the whole of Shu Han to Zhuge Liang with the words "if he proves unfit, you may take the throne yourself" — the end of Liu Bei’s life.
Connected figures: Liu Bei · Zhuge Liang · Liu Shan
Wuzhang Plains
Where Zhuge Liang’s last northern campaign was encamped. In a long standoff with Sima Yi, who could not be goaded to battle even by a gift of women’s dress, Zhuge Liang was worn down by toil and died in camp — the last scene of "giving one’s all until one’s heart stops beating."
Connected figures: Zhuge Liang · Sima Yi
Nanzhong
The tribal region of southern Shu Han. When it rebelled after Liu Bei’s death, Zhuge Liang led a campaign there and captured and released the chieftain Meng Huo seven times, winning hearts above all and securing the rear before his northern campaigns.
Connected figures: Zhuge Liang
Jianye
Sun Quan’s capital, the political center of Wu and the beginning of the "capital of Six Dynasties" history. Sun Quan ruled Jiangdong here for decades, through the great battles of Red Cliffs, Yiling, and the loss of Jing province.
Hefei
A border town fought over again and again by Wei and Wu. In 215 Zhang Liao, with seven thousand defenders, broke Sun Quan’s hundred thousand, surprising them by night and cutting straight to Sun Quan’s command tent, after which "Zhang Liao stops the crying" spread widely in Jiangdong.
Connected figures: Zhang Liao · Sun Quan
Maicheng
Guan Yu’s last stronghold after his defeat in Jing province. Caught front and back, he broke out with his remnants and was captured and killed with his adopted son Guan Ping by a Wu ambush — after the peak of "shaking the realm," his ruin here.
Yiling
Where Liu Bei fought his decisive battle in the eastern campaign to avenge Guan Yu. Lu Xun held his ground and waited at ease, then burned the linked camps across seven hundred li at the height of summer, all but annihilating the Shu army, and Liu Bei fell ill on retreat to Baidicheng.