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Translating a non-Chinese toponym into a Chinese exonym is a complex task, given the high number of homophones in Chinese, the existence of multiple conventions for translation, and differences in the phonetic systems between the source language and Chinese.[1]
Generally, Chinese exonyms fall into three categories:
Phonetic transcriptions, for similarity of sound without regard for the meaning of the Chinese characters.[2] For example, London is translated to 伦敦 (Lúndūn), but the individual characters 伦 (lún, order) and 敦 (dūn, kindhearted) are only used for their sounds, not their meanings.
Literal translations, where the underlying meaning of the name is directly translated into Chinese characters.[2] For example, Salt Lake City is translated to 盐湖城 (Yánhú Chéng), with the individual characters being 盐 (yán, salt) 湖 (hú, lake) 城 (chéng, city).
For certain countries who use, or historically used, Chinese characters, the Chinese exonyms is simply the Chinese reading of the characters of that place's native name, which may be substantially different from the native readings of those characters.[3] For instance, Tokyo is written as 東京 in Kanji and pronounced Tōkyō, but in Mandarin Chinese this is pronounced Dōngjīng. The meanings of the characters 東 (eastern) and 京 (capital) are preserved after the translation.[2]
There are other exonyms that are a combination of translation and transcription (meaning and sound) of the endonym. For example, Hamburg is written as 汉堡 (Hànbǎo), in which the second character 堡 (bǎo, fort, castle), is a translation of the German "burg", (fortress, castle); and the first character 汉 (Hàn) is a transcription of "Ham".[2]
Names of foreign nations are sometimes shortened to their first character when used in compounds. For example, the name for Russia in Chinese is 俄罗斯 (Éluósī), but the name of the Russian language is 俄语 (Éyǔ), anything Russian-style is 俄式 (Éshì), and the Russian military is 俄军 (Éjūn).
^Qu, Wensheng; Li, Run (2015). "Translation of Personal and Place Names from and into Chinese in Modern China: A Lexicographical History Perspective". International Journal for the Semiotics of Law - Revue internationale de Sémiotique juridique. 28 (3): 525–557. doi:10.1007/s11196-015-9414-0. ISSN 0952-8059.
^ abcdde La Robertie, Pierre (2005). "Le nom propre en chinois. Essai de morphosyntaxe". Corela. HS-2.
^Liu, Lian’an; Gao, Yu; Ji, Yuan (2017). "New Developments in Formulating the Transformation Guidelines of Geographical Names from Foreign Languages into Chinese" (PDF). Eleventh United Nations Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names.
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