Names of China

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The different usages and names for China in world languages are generally consistent with how knowledge of China's existence first reached each culture, by two distinct routes:

Most Chinese people (i.e. those familiar with Chinese ethnic divisions) carefully make a distinction between China proper — inhabited by ethnic Han Chinese (often referred to simply as "Chinese" outside of China), and China, which also includes Tibetans, Uyghurs, Zhuang, Yanbianese Koreans, Mongols, Manchus, and many other Chinese ethnic groups.

On the other hand, many others—particularly those advocating independence or greater autonomy for Tibet and other non-Han Chinese regions—tend to equate China with China proper.

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Sinitic names

In modern China, the term Zhongguo is used to refer to all of China, including China proper, Manchuria, Inner Mongolia, Xinjiang, and Tibet. By contrast, Han refers to the Han Chinese ethnic group, who are mostly concentrated in China proper, Manchuria, and only parts of the other three regions. There is no general Chinese term for just China proper, or just the territories inhabited by Han Chinese.

Zhonghua is a more literary term used synonymously with Zhongguo; it appears in the official names of both the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China. Tang is used synonymously with Han among southern Chinese, though some restrict the term further to refer to just Cantonese or some other south Chinese language group.

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Zhongguo

Central Kingdom (中國/中国 pinyin: zhōngguó) in Mandarin

The Chinese traditionally positioned the emperor of China at the center of the world, conceiving of concentric rings that extend from the cultural center to barbaric borderlands. This notion was accepted in Japan, Korea, and Vietnam, and to some degree in other countries. This word can be traced back as early as the Zhou dynasty; however, the actual use of this term only became popularized during the modern age in both China and other East Asian nations.

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Zhonghua

This means Middle Prosperity (中華/中华 pinyin: zhōnghuá) in Mandarin and originally referred to the culturally rich land of Henan. In Chinese it is used today only in certain compounds (e.g., 中华文化 "Chinese culture") or for poetic effect, and carries a positive connotation, unlike zhongguo, which is neutral.

Overseas Chinese are referred to as huaqiao (華僑 or 华侨), literally "Chinese overseas", or huayi (華裔 or 华裔), literally "Chinese descendant" (i.e., Chinese children born overseas).

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Han

The name Han (漢/汉 pinyin: hàn) comes from the Han Dynasty, who presided over China's first golden age. During the Sixteen Kingdoms and Northern and Southern Dynasties periods, various non-Chinese ethnic groups invaded from the north and conquered North China, which they held for several centuries. It was during this period that people began to use the term "Han" to refer to the natives of North China, who (unlike the invaders) were the descendants of the subjects of the Han Dynasty.

During the Yuan Dynasty Mongolian ruler divided people into four classes: Mongolians, "Color-eyeds", Hans, and "Southerns". Northern Chinese were called Han, which was considered to be the highest class of Chinese. The name "Han" became popularly accepted.

During the Qing Dynasty, the Manchu rulers also used the name Han to distinguish the local Chinese from the Manchus. When the Republic was set up, the Han became the name of a nationality within China.

Today the term Han Chinese is used by the People's Republic of China to refer to the most populous of the 56 officially recognized ethnic groups of China. The "Han Chinese" are simply referred to as "Chinese" by some outside of China, especially among advocates of independence for non-Han regions.

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Tang

The name Tang (唐 pinyin: táng, Cantonese: tong4) comes from the Tang Dynasty, who presided over China's second golden age. It was during the Tang Dynasty that South China was finally and fully Sinicized; hence it is usually South Chinese who refer to themselves as "Tang". For example, Chinatowns worldwide are usually dominantly Cantonese; they are hence referred to generally as Tong-yan-gaai (唐人街 pinyin: tángrénjiē), or "Street (i.e., town) of Tang People". The name karate (空手）(a form of martial arts) was originally written as (唐手) (Chinese: Tangshou, Japanese: karate; meaning: Chinese hands) in respect of its Chinese origin. Cantonese people may also use Tang to refer exclusively to Cantonese themselves.

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Huaxia

The name Huaxia (华夏 pinyin: huáxià) is the combination of two words:

  • Hua which means prosper.
  • Xia which could mean the Xia dynasty or grandiose.

This word has been widely used to refer to the Huang He river valley, by analogy with Zhonghua, which means "middle prosper", before Han became popular.

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Tianxia

Tianxia (天下 pinyin: tiānxià) literally means "under heaven". This term is usually used in the context of civil wars or periods of division, in which whoever ends up reunifying China is said to have gotten tianxia, or everything under heaven. Although it was known since ancient times that this is, geographically speaking, not strictly true, this metaphor is nevertheless very common in both ancient and modern usage.

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Jiuzhou

The name Jiuzhou (九州 pinyin: jiǔ zhōu) means "nine states." The word originated during the middle of Warring States Period of China. During that time, the Huang He river region was divided into nine geographical regions; thus this name was coined. (Consult Zhou for more information.) In present-day usage, Jiuzhou would most likely be the Chinese rendition of "Kyushu", one of the islands that comprise Japan.

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Chixian Shenzhou

This name means Divine Land (神州 pinyin Shénzhōu) and comes from the same period as Jiuzhou. It was thought that the world was divided into nine major states, each of which was in turn divided into nine smaller states, one of which was Jiuzhou mentioned above. This small state was also called 赤县神州 (pinyin Chìxiàn-Shénzhōu), meaning Red Territory and Divine Land.

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Sihai

This name, Four Seas (四海 pinyin sìhǎi), is sometimes is used to refer to China. At other times it simply means "the country". It came from the ancient notion that land was surrounded by sea in all four directions.

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Other names

Names used in the rest of Asia, especially East and Southeast Asia, are usually derived directly from words in a language of China learned through the land-route. Those languages belonging to a former dependency (tributary) or Chinese-influenced country have a pronunciation especially similar pronunciation to that of Chinese. Those used in European languages, however, have indirect names that came via the sea-route and bear little resemblance to what is used in China.

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Chin

From Sanskrit Cin (चीन IPA: Template:IPA), this name possibly derives from the name of the Qin Empire (2nd century BC).

Marco Polo described China specifically as Chin, which is the word used in Persian, the main lingua franca on his route. Barbosa (1516) and Garcia de Orta (1563) mentioned China.

The mention of the Chinas in ancient Sanskrit literature, both in the Laws of Manu and in the Mahabhārata, has often been supposed to prove the application of the name before the predominance of the Qin Dynasty. It is said purportedly that the coupling of that name with the Daradas, still surviving as the people of Dardistan, on the Indus River, suggests it as more probable that those names 'Cin' and 'China' were a kindred race of mountaineers, whose name as Shinas in fact likewise remains applied to a branch of the Dard ethnicity(?).

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Sin

A name possibly of origin separate from "Chin"

  • Arabic: Sin صين
  • English (prefix of adjectives): Sino- (i.e. Sino-American), Sinitic (the Chinese language family).
  • Latin/Greek: Sinæ
  • Hebrew: Sin (סִין)

This name is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible in Exodus 10:17, where it is said that the Sinites are descendants of Canaan, the son of Ham. This is taken by some to indicate the Chinese.

It probably came to Europe through the Arabs, who made the China of the farther east into Sin, and perhaps sometimes into Thin. Hence the Thin of the author of the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, who appears to be the first extant writer to employ the name in this form; hence also the Sinæ and Thinae of Ptolemy.

Some denied that the Sinæ of Ptolemy really represented the Chinese. But if we compare the statement of Marcianus of Heraclea (a mere condenser of Ptolemy), when he tells us that the "nations of the Sinae lie at the extremity of the habitable world, and adjoin the eastern Terra Incognita," with that of Cosmas, who says, in speaking of Tzinista, a name of which no one can question the application to China, that "beyond this there is neither habitation nor navigation" -- we cannot doubt the same region to be meant by both. The fundamental error of Ptolemy's conception of the Indian Sea as a closed basin rendered it impossible except if he happened to misplace the Chinese coast. However, most scholars still believe Sinæ is China, because:

  • the name of Sina was used among the Arabs from time immemorial as applied to the Chinese
  • in the work of Ptolemy, this name certainly represented the farthest known East
  • Ptolemy's configurations and longitudes are inaccurate, and yet he described India as well, whose coordination was faulty, like that of Sinæ.
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Ser

An earlier usage than Sin, possibly related.

This may be a back formation from serikos (σηρικος), "made of silk", from sêr (σηρ), "silkworm," in which case Seres is "the land where silk comes from."

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Cathay

This group of names derives from Khitan, an ethnic group that originated in Manchuria and conquered Northern China. Due to long domination of Northern China by these non-Chinese conquerors, it was considered by northwestern people as the land of the Khitan. In English and in several other European languages, the name "Cathay" became widely used for all of China largely as a result of translations of the adventures of Marco Polo, which used this word for northern China.

There is no evidence that either in the 13th or 14th century, Cathayans, i.e. Chinese, travelled officially to Europe, but it is possible that some did, in unofficial capacity, at least in the 13th century. For, during the campaigns of Hulagu (the grandson of Genghis Khan) in Persia (1256-65), and the reigns of his successors, Chinese engineers were employed on the banks of the Tigris, and Chinese astrologers and physicians could be consulted at Tabriz. Many diplomatic communications passed between the Hulaguid Ilkhans and the Christian princes. The former, as the great khan's liegemen, still received from him their seals of state; and two of their letters which survive in the archives of France exhibit the vermilion impressions of those seals in Chinese characters -- perhaps affording the earliest specimen of those characters which reached western Europe.

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Tabgach

"Tabgach" came from the metatheses of "Tuoba" (*takbat), a dominant tribe of the Xianbei. It referred to Northern China, which was dominated by half-Xianbei, half-Chinese people.

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Nikan

Manchu: nikan

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Rgya nag

Tibetan: rgya nag

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Mangi

From Chinese Manzi (southern barbarians). The division of North China and South China under the Jinn Dynasty and Song Dynasty weakened the dogma that China should be unified, and it was common for a time to call the politically disparate North and South by different names. While Northern China was called Cathay, Southern China was referred to as Mangi. Manzi often appears in documents of the Mongol Yuan Dynasty. The Mongols also called Southern Chinese "Nangkiyas" or "Nangkiyad", and considered them ethnically distinct from North Chinese. As Marco Polo used it, the word "Manzi" reached the Western world as "Mangi".

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Official Names

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People's Republic of China

The name New China has been frequently applied to China by the Communist Party as a political, social, and positive term contrasting China before 1949 (the establishment of the PRC) and the new socialist state. This term is also sometimes used by writers outside mainland China. The PRC has also been known (mainly during the Cold War) as Communist China, and somewhat disparagingly as Red China to distinguish it from the ROC on Taiwan (once called Nationalist China or Free China). In some contexts, particularly in economics, trade and sporting, "China" is often used to refer to mainland China to the exclusion of Hong Kong and Macau.

The official name of the People's Republic of China in various languages and scripts.

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Republic of China

The official name of the Republic of China in various languages

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See also

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