Abstract: When we study famous historical cities in China, we often find an interesting phenomenon, in which most of them are accompanied by lakes, such as the West Lake in Hangzhou, South Lake in Nanning and Star Lake in Zhaoqing. These urban lakes were closely related to the development of the historical cities. However, their resonance with the historical development of ancient cities is still in the process of open researches. There is no conclusion on the structure characteristics of their distribution. Based on the structural axes of the historical trails emerging in the Tang Dynasty, i.e. the south line and the southeast line, and referring to the historical documents about the distribution of the “city-lake” systems in ancient China, this paper has initially formed a structural understanding that the “city-lake” system of the historical urban structure in China has close relationship with the construction of large-scale prefecture city areas since the Tang and Song Dynasties. It also accommodates to the topography of the southeast areas to the Hu Line which is mainly hilly regions. This is significant to indicate the historical formation of the landscape of hills and waters created on the basis of the natural topography background in the suburban areas in historical cities of China.