Chenliu 陳留

Commandery in Yan Province; home region of Cai Yong, Gao Gan, Zhang Miao and others; Cao Cao’s ancestral county was in Chenliu.

Chenliu (陳留) was a commandery of Yan Province on the central plains, with its seat at Qi County (杞縣) in what is now the Kaifeng region of Henan.

Cao Cao’s family was from Qi County, Chenliu, and the area was central to his early rise. The commandery also produced the scholar Cai Yong, Gao Gan (a nephew of Yuan Shao), and Zhang Miao, who was Administrator of Chenliu and joined the coalition against Dong Zhuo. Chenliu remained strategically important throughout the civil wars.