Guangxi, officially the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China, located in South China and bordering Vietnam and the Gulf of Tonkin. Formerly a province, Guangxi became an autonomous region in 1958. Its current capital is Nanning. Guangxi's location, in mountainous terrain in the far south of China, has placed it on the frontier of Chinese civilization throughout much of Chinese history.