【Introduction】

The Erhkunshen Fort was previously called the Great Artillery Fort of Anping. It is also popularly known as Yizhai Jincheng (The Golden City of a Hundred Million Years). The construction of the fort commenced in 1874 and was completed in two years. It was the first Western-style artillery fort in Taiwan’s history, and the only cannon bastion fort with symmetrical geometric patterns. The construction of the fort was triggered by the Mudan Incident, in which fishermen from the Ryukyu Islands who landed in southern Taiwan after a storm were killed by aboriginal tribes from the southern settlement. Claiming the Ryukyus as its protectorate, Japan sent an expedition to Taiwan in 1874. The Qing government protested strongly and Shen Baozhen was tasked with a mission of handling the island’s diplomacy and sea defenses. After arriving at Taiwan, Shen chose Anping as the location for a Western-style artillery fort and recruited French engineers to design the fort. The fort has protruding bastions at its four corners andwalls indented towards the center each side. Guns were installed on the protruding bastions to extend the range of fire. Rifle troops were deployed in the indented areas to defend against close-range assaults. Later, the situation at hand led to the installation of five British-made Armstrong 18-ton muzzle-loading guns on the seaside wall. On each of the other walls, four 20-pound guns and four 40-pound guns were placed. The fort was guarded by 272 artillery troops and a rifle unit. Food storage rooms, barracks, a kitchen, an ammunition depot and a pool were also built inside the fort; none of these remains today.

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