Ordos Plateau

The Ordos Plateau is a high, partly desert region of northern China, enclosed on three sides by the great northern loop of the Yellow River and now mainly in Inner Mongolia. A frontier between Chinese farmers and steppe peoples, it was contested by the Xiongnu and the Han, settled by the Southern Xiongnu and later by Tangut groups, and gives its name to the Ordos bronzes of the steppe animal style.