The old Beijing Legation Quarter was the area where a number of foreign legations were located between 1861 and 1959. In Chinese, the area is known as Dōng Jiāo Mín Xiàng which is the name of the hutong running through the area. It is located immediately to the east of Tiananmen Square.

Following China's defeat in the Second Opium War in 1856-1860, the Zongli Yamen was established as a foreign office of the Qing and the area around Dong Jiangmi Xiang was opened for a number of foreign legations.

The foreign legations were originally scattered close to the Qing imperial government in the southern part of Beijing's old inner city, just east of Tian'anmen Square and north ofQianmenand Chongwenmen. During the Boxer Rebellion in 1900, the Legation Quarter became the center of an international incident as it was besieged by boxers for several months. After the siege had been broken by the Eight-Nation Alliance at the end of the Battle of Peking, the foreign powers obtained the right to station troops to protect their legations under the terms of the Boxer Protocol. The Legation Quarter was encircled by a wall and all Chinese residents in the area were ordered to move out.Sealed off from its immediate environment, the Legation Quarter became a city within the city exclusively for foreigners and many Chinese nationalists resented the Quarter as a symbol of foreign aggression.

In 1937, upon the eruption of the Second Sino-Japanese War, most foreign legations, apart from those of the Axis Powers, quit Beijing. The Legation Quarter was then officially handed back to the Republic of China government. At the time of the establishment of the People's Republic of China (1949), a number of foreign legations were still situated here, but after 1959 foreign missions were moved toSanlitunoutside the old city walls.