Cathay
Cathay (/kæˈθeɪ/ ka-THAY) is a historical name for China that was used in Europe. During the early modern period, the term Cathay initially evolved as a term referring to what is now Northern China, completely separate and distinct from China, which was a reference to southern China. As knowledge of East Asia increased, Cathay came to be seen as the same polity as China as a whole. The term Cathay became a poetic name for China.
The name Cathay originates from the term
History
The term Cathay came from the name for the Khitans. A form of the name Cathai is attested in a
The Khitans were known to Muslim Central Asia: in 1026, the
The name's currency in the Muslim world survived the replacement of the Khitan Liao dynasty with the Jurchen
In about 1340 Francesco Balducci Pegolotti, a merchant from Florence, compiled the Pratica della mercatura, a guide about trade in China, a country he called Cathay, noting the size of Khanbaliq (modern Beijing) and how merchants could exchange silver for Chinese paper money that could be used to buy luxury items such as silk.[7][8]
Words related to Khitay are still used in many
Cathay and Mangi
As European and Arab travelers started reaching the
Identifying China as Cathay
The division of China into northern and southern parts ruled by, in succession, the Liao, Jin and Yuan dynasties in the north, and the Song dynasty in the south, ended in the late 13th century with the conquest of southern China by the Yuan dynasty.
While Central Asia had long known China under names similar to Cathay, that country was known to the peoples of Southeast Asia and India under names similar to China (cf. e.g. Cina in modern Malay). Meanwhile, in China itself, people usually referred to the realm in which they lived on the name of the ruling dynasty, e.g. Da Ming Guo ("Great Ming state") and Da Qing Guo ("Great Qing state"), or as Zhongguo (中國, lit. Middle Kingdom or Central State); see also Names of China for details.
When the Portuguese reached Southeast Asia (
It was a small group of
- The River "Yangtze" divides the empire into two halves, with nine provinces ("kingdoms") south of the river and six to the north;
- Marco Polo's "Cathay" was just south of "Tartary", and Ricci learned that there was no other country between the Ming Empire and "Tartary" (i.e., the lands of Mongols and Manchus).
- People in China had not heard of any place called "Cathay".
Most importantly, when the Jesuits first arrived to Beijing 1598, they also met a number of "Mohammedans" or "Arabian Turks" – visitors or immigrants from the Muslim countries to the west of China, who told Ricci that now they were living in the Great Cathay. This all made them quite convinced that Cathay was indeed China.[15]
In retrospect, the Central Asian Muslim informants' idea of the Ming China being a heavily Christian country may be explained by numerous similarities between Christian and Buddhist ecclesiastical rituals – from having sumptuous statuary and ecclesiastical robes to Gregorian chant – which would make the two religions appear externally similar to a Muslim merchant.[19] This may also have been the genesis of the Prester John myth.
To resolve the China–Cathay controversy, the India Jesuits sent a Portuguese lay brother,
Ricci's and de Gois' conclusion was not, however, completely convincing for everybody in Europe yet.
The last nail into the coffin of the idea of there being a Cathay as a country separate from China was, perhaps, driven in 1654, when the Dutch
Even then, some people still viewed Cathay as distinct from China, as did John Milton in the 11th Book of his Paradise Lost (1667).[23]
In 1939, Hisao Migo (Japanese: 御江久夫, a Japanese botanist[24][25]) published a paper describing Iris cathayensis (meaning "Chinese iris") in the Journal of the Shanghai Science Institute.[26]
Etymological progression
Below is the etymological progression from "Khitan" to Cathay as the word travelled westward:
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Names of China |
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- Хятад Khyatad)
- Uyghur: خىتاي (Xitay)
- Persian: ختای (khatāy)
- Kyrgyz: Кытай (Kytai)
- Kazakh: قىتاي, Қытай, Qıtay
- Kazan Tatar: Кытай (Qıtay)
- Russian: Китай (Kitay)
- Ukrainian: Китай (Kytaj)
- Belarusian: Кітай (Kitaj)
- Bulgarian: Китай (Kitay)
- Georgian: ხატაეთი (Khataeti) (archaic or obsolete)
- Uzbek: Хитой (Xitoy)
- Polish: Kitaj
- Slovenian: Kitaj (Китаj)
- Croatian: Kitaj
- Medieval Latin: Cataya, Kitai
- Italian: Catai
- Spanish: Catay
- Portuguese: Cataio or Catai
- French, English, German, Dutch, Scandinavian:[citation needed] Cathay
In many Turkic and Slavic languages a form of "Cathay" (e.g., Russian: Китай, Kitay) remains the usual modern name for China. In Javanese, the word ꦏꦠꦻ (Katai, Katé) exists,[27] and it refers to 'East Asian', literally meaning 'dwarf' or 'short-legged' in today's language.[citation needed]
Use in English
In the English language, the word Cathay was sometimes used for China, although increasingly only in a poetic sense, until the 19th century, when it was completely replaced by China. Demonyms for the people of Cathay (i.e., Chinese people) were Cathayan and Cataian. The terms China and Cathay have histories of approximately equal length in English. Cathay is still used poetically. The Hong Kong flag-bearing airline is named Cathay Pacific. One of the largest commercial banks of Taiwan is named Cathay United Bank.
The novel Creation by Gore Vidal uses the name in reference to "those states between the Yangtze and the Yellow Rivers" as the novel is set in the fifth and sixth centuries B.C. Ezra Pound's Cathay (1915) is a collection of classical Chinese poems translated freely into English verse.
In Robert E. Howard's Hyborian Age stories (including the tales of Conan the Barbarian), the analog of China is called Khitai.
In Warhammer Fantasy, a fantastical reimagination of the world used as a setting for various novels and games produced by Games Workshop, Grand Cathay is the largest human empire, situated in the far east of the setting and based on medieval China.[28]
In the names of organized entities
Cathay is more prevalent in proper terms, such as in
Cathay Bank is a bank with multiple branches throughout the United States and other countries.
Cathay United Bank and Cathay Life Insurance are, respectively, a financial services company and an insurance company, both located in Taiwan.
References
Citations
- ^ "Catalan Atlas. The Cresques Project - Panel VI". www.cresquesproject.net.
- ISBN 978-1-4426-6667-2.
- ^ "Cathay". Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica. 2009. Retrieved 23 June 2009.
- ^ a b c d e Wittfogel (1946), p. 1.
- ISBN 92-3-103467-7
- ^ ISBN 9781317451372.
- ISBN 0-495-57147-4.
- ^ See the following source for the title "Cathay and the Way Tither": Editors of the Encyclopædia Britannica. "Francesco Balducci Pegolotti." Encyclopædia Britannica (online source). Accessed 6 September 2016.
- ^ Dillon, Michael (2003). Xinjiang: China's Muslim Far Northwest. p. 177.
- ^ a b Wittfogel (1946), p. 2
- ^ Henry Yule; Henri Cordier (1967), Cathay and the Way Thither: Preliminary essay on the intercourse between China and the western nations previous to the discovery of the Cape route, p. 177
- ISBN 9789839541885.
- ISBN 9780226467085.
- Cochinand the Siamese as well, from whom the Portuguese learned to call the empire China, call this country Cin". (Gallagher (1953), pp. 6–7)
- Saracens, who live to the west, speak of it [China] as Cathay".
- ^ Lach & Van Kley (1993), p. 1565. Pantoja's letter appeared in Relación de la entrade de algunos padres de la Compania de Iesus en la China (1605)
- ^ Yule, pp. 534–535
- ^ a b c Lach & Kley (1993), pp. 1575–1577
- ^ Gallagher, p. 500; Yule, pp. 551–552
- ^ Henry Yule (1866), p. 530.
- JSTOR 4527279(specifically pp. 185–186)
- ^ van Dalen, Benno; Kennedy, E.S.; Saiyid, Mustafa K., "The Chinese-Uighur Calendar in Tusi's Zij-i Ilkhani", Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Arabisch-Islamischen Wissenschaften 11 (1997) 111–151
- ^ "Why Did Milton Err on Two Chinas?" Y. Z. Chang, The Modern Language Review, Vol. 65, No. 3 (Jul., 1970), pp. 493–498.
- ISBN 9781107070172.
- ^ "中国植物采集简史I — 1949年之前外国人在华采集(三)" (in Chinese). 中国科学院昆明植物研究所标本馆. 1 December 2014. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
- ^ "Iridaceae Iris cathayensis Migo". ipni.org (International Plant Names Index). Retrieved 21 January 2014.
- ^ "Ini Delapan Ramalan Joyoboyo tentang Nusantara yang Dipercaya Sakti". Detik News. (in Indonesian, transcription of King Jayabaya's prophecy)
- ^ Zak, Robert (19 October 2021). "Our first look at Total War: Warhammer 3's Cathay army in action is spectacular". PC Gamer. Retrieved 11 January 2022.
Sources
- Karl A. Wittfogel and Feng Chia-Sheng, "History of Chinese Society: Liao (907–1125)". in Transactions of American Philosophical Society (vol. 36, Part 1, 1946). Available on Google Books.
- Trigault, Nicolas S. J. "China in the Sixteenth Century: The Journals of Mathew Ricci: 1583–1610". English translation by Louis J. Gallagher, S.J. (New York: Random House, Inc. 1953) of the Latin work, De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas based on Matteo Ricci's journals completed by Nicolas Trigault. Of particular relevance are Book Five, Chapter 11, "Cathay and China: The Extraordinary Odyssey of a Jesuit Lay Brother" and Chapter 12, "Cathay and China Proved to Be Identical." (pp. 499–521 in 1953 edition). There is also full Latin text available on Google Books.
- "The Journey of Benedict Goës from Agra to Cathay" – Henry Yule's translation of the relevant chapters of De Christiana expeditione apud Sinas, with detailed notes and an introduction. In: Yule, Sir Henry, ed. (1866). Cathay and the way thither: being a collection of medieval notices of China. Issue 37 of Works issued by the Hakluyt Society. Translated by Yule, Sir Henry. Printed for the Hakluyt society. pp. 529–596.
- Lach, Donald F.; Van Kley, Edwin J. (1994), Asia in the Making of Europe, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, ISBN 978-0-226-46734-4. Volume III, A Century of Advance, Book Four, East Asia.