tor.liu wrote:FUllmoonfever wrote:what does shandong mean?
east of mountain(hill)
Pairing some other province names to help memorize them:
Shandong and Shanxi provinces: "Shan" denotes mountain, here refers to the Mountain Taihang. Dong: east, Xi: west. The Mountain Taihang divides the area into two parts, east part and west part, so the two provinces are named the Mountain East and Mountain West, e.g. Shangdong and Shangxi.
Guangdong and Guangxi Provinces: "Guang": ? sorry I don't know. dong: east, xi: west.
Henan and Hebai Provinces: "He" refers to river, the Yellow River. nan: south, bai: north.
Hunan and Hubai Provinces: "Hu" refers to lake, the Lake Dongtin. nan: south, bai: north.
There are many other Chinese names including "...nan" and '...bai', or "...dong" and "...xi", named by this way.