 | Names of China: Encyclopedia II - Names of China - Other names
Names of China - 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.
Names of China - Chin
From Sanskrit Cin (चीन 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.
- Albanian: Kinë
- Amharic: Chayna (from English; pronounced the same, with /ai/ dipthong)
- Bable: Xina
- Basque: Txina
- Bangla/Bengali: Chin (চীন IPA: //)
- Bosnian: Kina
- Catalan: Xina (IPA /ʃina/)
- Czech: Čína (IPA /ʧi:na/)
- Danish: Kina
- Dutch: China
- English: China (IPA /'ʧaɪnə/)
- Esperanto: Ĉinujo or Ĉinio or Ĥinujo
- Estonian: Hiina
- Filipino (Tagalog): Tsina
- Finnish: Kiina
- French: Chine (IPA /ʃin/)
- German: China (IPA /'çi:na/, in some southern dialects also /'ki:na/)
- Greek: Κίνα (Kína)
- Hindi: Cheen (चीन IPA: //)
- Hungarian: Kína (IPA /ki:nɒ/)
- Indonesian: Cina
- Interlingua: China
- Irish: An tSín (IPA /ən ˈtʲi:nʲ/)
- Italian: Cina (IPA /ˈʧi:na/)
- Japanese: Shina (支那) — considered offensive in China, now largely obsolete in Japan and avoided out of deference to China, see Shina (word) and kotobagari.
- Korean: Jin, Chin
- Lithuanian: Kinija
- Norwegian: Kina
- Pahlavi: čīnī
- Persian: Chin چين
- Polish: Chiny (IPA /'xin
ı/)
- Portuguese: China (IPA /ʃi'nɐ/)
- Romanian: China (IPA /ki:na/)
- Serbian: Кина (IPA /ki:na/)
- Slovak: Čína (IPA /ʧi:na/)
- Spanish: China (IPA /ʧi:na/)
- Swedish: Kina (IPA /'ɕi:na/)
- Tamil: Cheenaa
- Thai: Jiin (จีน)
- Turkish: Çin
- Urdu: čīn (چين)
- Welsh: Tsieina
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(?).
Names of China - 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.
Names of China - Ser
An earlier usage than Sin, possibly related.
- Greek: Seres, Serikos
- Latin: Serica
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."
Names of China - 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.
- Classical Mongolian: Kitad
- English: Cathay
- Kazan Tatar: Qıtay
- Medieval Latin: Cataya, Kitai
- Mongolian: Hyatad (Хятад)
- Portuguese: Catai
- Russian: Kitai (Китай)
- Slovene: Kitajska
- Ukrainian: Kytai (Китай)
- Uygur: Hyty
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.
Names of China - 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.
- Byzantine Greek: Taugats
- Orhon Kok-Turk: Tabgach (variations Tamgach)
Names of China - Nikan
Manchu: nikan
Names of China - Rgya nag
Tibetan: rgya nag
Names of China - 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".
- Chinese: Manzi (蠻子)
- Latin: Mangi
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