The history of the Yangzhou can be traced back to the 4th century BC when it was part of the state of Wu. In 590 AD, the city began to be called Yangzhou, which was the traditional name of what was then the entire southeastern part of China. In 605, Yangzhou became the Southern Capital of the Sui Dynasty. With the completion of the Grand Canal, which flows through the center of the city into the Changjiang, Yangzhou became a hub of transportation between South and North China and an important port for foreign trade.

Marco Polo served there under the Mongol emperor Kubilai Khan in the period around 1282-1287 (to 1285, according to Perkins). Although some versions of Polo's memoirs imply that he was the governor of Yangzhou, it is more likely that he was an official in the salt industry. The discovery of the 1342 tomb of Katarina Vilioni, member of an Italian trading family in Yangzhou, suggests the existence of a thriving Italian community in the city in the 14th century.

During the Ming and Qing eras, Yangzhou was the center of the salt trade. The salt merchants accumulated incredible wealth and, between the 16th and 18th centuries, acted as patrons, so that Yangzhou developed into a cultural center. The Grand Canal floods in 1855 were a large-scale catastrophe which resulted in the shipping of all Beijing-bound grain by sea from Shanghai to Tianjin.

From the time of the Taiping Rebellion (1853) to the end of the Communist revolution (1949) Yangzhou was in decline, due to war damage and neglect of the Jinghang Canal as railways replaced it in importance; unfortunately, initial plans for railways connecting Yangzhou were deemed to be unimportant, and its status as the leading economic centre of China declined rapidly into a city of little importance.

After 1949, Yangzhou became an important land and water traffic junction in the northern part of the province. Arts and crafts are of special significance in Yangzhou. Among these are the traditional lacquerware, jade carvings, silhouttes, embroidery and printing. The lacquered works of Yangzhou have a tradition of more than 2,000 years. The golden age of this trade was as early as the Han Dynasty. The art of jade carving does not go back that far; in Yangzhou it did not reach its peak until the Tang era. The people of Yangzhou are known in China as the 'masters of three knives', mainly for their skills as cooksm, barbers and pedicurists. �