May 3, 1305 Earthquake: Huairen, Datong, Shanxi Province, China
A magnitude 6.5 earthquake struck Huairen, Datong, Shanxi Province, China on May 3, 1305. It killed 2,000 people.
Map
Where it struck, with the other significant earthquakes within 200 km. Circles are sized and colored by magnitude; select one for its page.
The earthquake
- Date
- May 3, 1305
- Place
- Huairen, Datong, Shanxi Province, China
- Magnitude
- 6.5 (Ms)
- Intensity
- IX, violent shaking, on the Modified Mercalli scale
- Tsunami
- None recorded
- Epicenter
- 39.800° N, 113.100° E
- Country
- China
- Region
- East Asia
The toll
- Deaths
- 2,000
- Damage
- Severe (about $5 to $25 million)
- Houses destroyed
- 5,800
Where the literature gives no number, NCEI records a description on a scale of 1 to 4, printed here in its words. Damage is in millions of US dollars of the year of the event, not adjusted for inflation.
What the record says
NCEI’s account, from the sources it cites.
May 3, 1305, in and around Huairen and Datong, Shanxi Province, 39.8 N, 113.1 E, magnitude 6.5 intensity VIII-IX.
More than 5,000 houses in Datong Lu were destroyed and over 2,000 people were killed.
At Huairen, ground cracked at two places (one fissure
was 18 paces in length and 50 m in depth, another
is 66 paces in length and over 3 m in depth.) Black
water gushed out.
Quwu: An earthquake occurred in the 4th month.
Note: At that time, Datong was the seat of the local
government of the Datong Lu, which had jurisdiction
over five counties and eight prefectures,
located in the northern part of the present-day
Shanxi Province and Inner Mongolia Autonomous
Region.
(above from reference #3939)
Reference #1055 lists May 3, 1305, China (Shansi), 5,800 houses were destroyed and 1,400 people killed.
Sources NCEI cites
The publications NCEI lists for this record. The numbers match the “reference #” notes in its account above.
- #3959 Gu, G.X. (Chief Editor) (1983). Catalog of Chinese Earthquakes (1970-1979), 334 p., Science Press, Beijing, (in Chinese).
- #1055 Milne, John (1911). Catalogue of Destructive Earthquakes [7 to 1899 A.D.], Report of the 81st Meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, Portsmouth, London, United Kingdom, p. 649-740.
- #1048 Academia Sinica (1970). Catalog of Chinese Earthquakes; vol. I (1177 BC to 1900 AD) and vol. II (1901 to 1949). Institute of Geophysics, Peking, China. [in Chinese]
Other significant earthquakes nearby
Within 200 km, the deadliest first.
- January 9, 1038, Dingxiang, Xinxian, Shaanxi Province, China
- June 28, 1626, Shanxi Province, China
- May 21, 512, Yingxian, Shaanxi Province, China
- November 22, 1683, Shanxi Province, China
- January 10, 1998, Shangyi-Zhangbei, Hebei, Northeastern, China
- October 6, 1628, Hebei Province, China
- October 18, 1989, Shanxi and Hebei Provinces, Datong, China
- September 22, 1898, Shanxi Province, China
- January 13, 1929, Nei Mongol, China
- April 1022, Datong, Shaanxi Province, China
- March 25, 1991, NE, Datong, China
- November 1, 1999, Northeastern, Shanxi, China
- October 8, 1952, Shanxi Province, China
- January 26, 1911, Hebei Province, China
- 1664, Shanxi Province, China
More
Significant earthquakes of 1305The 1300sRecent earthquakes near hereThis day in weather history
Sources
Significant earthquakes from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information, Global Historical Hazard Database, cited as NCEI/WDS, doi:10.7289/V5PN93H7. Public domain. Read 2026-10-01. NCEI earthquake 506.