Taiwan
Pronunciation: /ˌtaɪ̯ˈwɑn/
The English word “Taiwan” has 5 meanings listed here.
proper noun
- A partly-recognized country in East Asia consisting of a main island and 167 smaller islands. Official name: Republic of China. Capital: Taipei.
- An island between the Taiwan Strait and Philippine Sea in East Asia.
- A former dependency of Japan (1895–1945).
- The territory currently under the de facto jurisdiction of the Republic of China (Taiwan).
- 2169 Taiwan, a main belt asteroid.
Etymology
The specific form "Taiwan" in English emerged from the Wade–Giles Tʻai²-wan¹ romanization of Mandarin 臺灣／台湾 (Táiwān), and also perhaps the romaji of Japanese 臺灣(たいわん) (taiwan), both of which are ultimately from Literary Chinese 臺灣, from Hokkien 大員 (Tāi-oân), 大圓, 臺員, 大灣, 臺灣, and other forms, a placename initially referring to a sandbank peninsula that later silted up; now wholly part of the island…
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Definitions are from Wiktionary, extracted by Kaikki.org, and are available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.