Twenty-first century urban China moves too quickly for travel guidebook publishers. Arrive in any Chinese city and handfuls of new hotels will have sprung up and myriad restaurants and bars will have opened, closed or moved since a solitary researcher roughed it through two years before you.  There may even be a glassy new building or two created by an acclaimed starchitect, and an entertainment district suffixed 'tiandi'.

China’s ceaseless drive for modernity has created another problem for publishers; in the rush to record the endless stream of boutique openings, the attention to historical narrative has diminished. At such times, only the classics will do. So, as I sat shivering on the drizzle-dashed fortress walls of Xi’an, I reached for the writings of an inveterate China Hand.

Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s terracotta warriors, now one of Asia’s foremost tourist sites, lay shattered and embedded in the Shaanxi clay when Carl Crow published his seminal Handbook for China in 1933 – but his words are timeless. '[Shi Huangdi], who assumed the title of emperor … removed his capital to the city now known as Sianfu, and there built magnificent palaces, which far surpassed any previous architectural attempts in China,' Crow enthused. '[It is] the most interesting city, historically, in all of China.'

Sianfu, also previously known as Siking, Jingzhaofu and Chang’an, is now Xi’an – and it remains an absorbing destination for anyone with even a passing interest in Chinese history. The nation’s capital for the best part of eight hundred years, Xi’an has – during various periods in time – been the nation’s urban driving force. During its incarnation as Chang’an, it was once the world’s largest city, and stood as an eastern counter-balance to the hegemony of imperial Rome. Its unique, chessboard-style metropolitan layout influenced later capitals of China – including Beijing – and Nara in Japan.

As with most great cities, location was a determining factor in the development of Xi’an. Built on cloying orange clay at the margin of the Loess Plain in central China, it was a meeting point for all-comers; from north, south, east and west.  Yet Xi’an’s status as the starting – and finishing – point for the Silk Road trade route linking China with Asia and Europe was rooted in geology, as much as geography. 'Sianfu is about 30 li from the Wei River, a tributary of the Yellow River, and about 250 li from the Yellow River proper,' Crow surmised. 'This upper part of the Yellow River [was] not navigable, and Sianfu acquired its present importance by overland trade.'

Today, Xi’an is a conduit between China’s east-coast urban centres and the emerging cities of the west – with trade flowing both across and above land. A stopping point for Lhasa-bound trains from Beijing and Shanghai, Xi’an also has China’s ninth busiest passenger airport, and the world’s fifth-fastest-growing cargo airport.

But mostly, Xia’n is associated with tourism – and, particularly, the fearsome, man-sized tomb guardians of Emperor Qin Shi Huang, which attract two million visitors each year. So popular have the terracotta warriors become that Beijing travel agents offer a tailored express product for time poor, travel hungry clients: the one-day terracotta tour.  An early flight from the capital to Xi’an is followed by a quick trip around the warriors museum, lunch and a flight home. Zipping in and out of Xi’an at such speed does it a disservice, however, because Crow’s words endure: it is a most-interesting city.

Arriving at night is a good start, as the magnificent Ming dynasty fortress walls that encase the old city – and which were restored in the 1980s – are resplendently lit with hanging red lanterns. By day, the 12-metre high angled fortifications are dark, brooding and incredibly handsome, and strolling the elevated ramparts feels a little like floating between history and reality. Back on terra firma, the Drum Tower, Large and Small Wild Goose Pagodas, Forest of Stones, Shaanxi Museum, Banpo Village and the restored 16th-century Bell Tower, which now sits in the middle of a traffic circle, comprise an enviable portfolio of 'must see' attractions.

A wander through the Moslem district – a legacy from the Silk Road, when Islam moved eastward across China – is also de rigueur, and neatly illustrates the multicultural underpinnings of Xi’an. Sweet pastries, roasting walnuts and mutton kebabs spice the air, while the becalming ambience of the exquisite Grand Mosque – an Islamic place of worship in a beautiful Chinese courtyard garden complex – is well worth fighting your way through the narrow winding market that precedes it, with seemingly endless rows of hawkers pressing Mao watches and replica terracotta warriors on unassuming tourists.

Yet, despite its diverse archaeological and architectural attractions, a critical piece of the Xi’an tourism jigsaw has always been missing. The walls and warriors drew the crowds, but they also overshadowed the city – suffocating its broader historical narrative in deference to those who created its signature structures. As Crow wrote, 'the neighborhood of the city abounds in tombs, monuments and other relics of great antiquity' – but the historical sum of the imperial tombs that ring the city, and the pagodas and towers that dot its flat cityscape, was hard to calculate.

The city sensed this tourism disconnect, and last May opened the three-floor Xi’an Museum near to the Small Wild Goose Pagoda. Though outwardly a rather clumsy, unappealing construct, it is a treasury of well-curated artefacts and – crucially – rich historical detail. Insouciantly marketed, however, it adheres to the city’s timeless penchant for hidden riches: neither the hotel concierge nor several taxi drivers had heard of it. My guidebook was, of course, useless – and Crow, though he would indubitably have approved, offers priceless context not up-to-the-minute cultural listings. In such circumstances, searching out a local student is a failsafe ploy that works in any city. Sometimes, as in this case, the taxi driver will even gratefully acknowledge the street savvy of a younger fellow citizen. 

The Xi’an Museum isn’t perfect – on occasion it lapses into a confusing interweaving of dynasties, kingdoms and indefinable historic periods, but it makes an admirable stab at narrating the city’s complex novella. The starting point is an impressive 1:1500 scale model of the Tang dynasty walled capital of Chang’an, with the grand Daming Palace as its northern headstone and markets flanking the east and west gates.

From here, visitors follow a well-captioned path through a stellar collection of around two thousand archaeological treasures, including stone coffins engraved with historical scenes and landscapes, imperial tomb guardians, large stone camels, pottery figurines of Han dynasty men and women wearing floor-length fishtail robes, a Tang dynasty warrior dressed in a green, white and brown uniform with a dragon’s head helmet that seemingly clenches his head between its jaws. There is also a fine exhibition of marble, stone and pottery Buddhist statues and engraved stele, and a large collection of jade sculptures and calligraphy.