Sharing my pet theory on the connection between claimed Chinese historical name for the Senkaku islands 高華嶼 with its current Chinese name 釣魚臺.
The name Gaohua island (高華) showed up first in the Book of Sui, and it is recorded as a way point between Fujian, Kume island, and Ryukyu.
Hanji
colloq Taigi
lit Taigi
Old Tsuân accent
MC
高華
ko-huâ
kau-huâ
kau-hue
kaw-hwæ
鉤魚
koo-hî
kau-hî
kau-gɨ
kuw-ngjo
It seems very likely that once the pronunciation for 魚 went through the ng > g > h sound change in the Old Tsuân accent, 高華 would have sounded very similar to 鉤魚, which is synonymous with 釣魚. The term 釣魚臺 first appeared in late Ming dynasty writings, naming the Records of Emissary Journey to Ryukyu (使琉球錄) written in 1532, which would have given enough time for the sound change to take place. In that record, the new King of Ryukyu sent two ships to take Ming’s ambassador Chen Kan (陳侃) to Ryukyu to attend his coronation. Before the Ryukyuan ships and sailors arrived, Chen and local Fujian sailors were very concerned that they don’t know how to sail to Ryukyu.
So assuming the etymology for 釣魚 and 高華 are the same, the question next would be what’s the ultimate etymology for 高華?
May I propose the Austronesian word for fishhook: *kawil, which is related to the word for hook *kawit
PAN
Puyuma
Pangcah Amis
Kavalan
Tagalog
fishhook
*kawil
kawiɭ
kawíl
hook
*kawit
kawit
qawit
káwit
So maybe the person who change 高華 to 鉤魚 wasn’t only reflecting the sound change in the Holo language, but also knew what the original root *kawil meant?
Since I’ve grown up in Zhonghe at one point (using some sorta visa) and came back to formalize my citizenship, I might as well put that in here, and since Yonghe ties into the story, I might as well mention them too.
Zhonghe: The earliest predecessor of Zhonghe District was “Zhonghe Village” established in 1920, which was named after the two villages “Zhongkeng” and “Zhanghe” in the territory.
Yonghe: On April 1, 1958, Yonghe Town was officially established. It was originally named “Zhongxing Town”, but because it was easily confused with Zhongxing New Village in Nantou City, where the Taiwan Provincial Government was located at that time, it was renamed. Due to the violent fighting that took place in Zhangquan in the early years, local elder Mr. Yang Zhongzuo named it “Yonghe” to pray for harmony, unity, and “permanent peace” among all ethnic groups to coexist and create local prosperity. There are other theories about the name of Yonghe. The “Yonghe Town Chronicles” published in 1965 has a preface written by Duan Jianmin, the then Henan Provincial Legislator. It takes the allusion of the Celebrity Meeting in Lanting in the 9th year of Yonghe in the Eastern Jin Dynasty (353 AD) and interprets it as “anti-Communist and restoration of the country”.
In addition, Zhonghe Township also has the name of Yonghe (jiezhuang, big character) that existed during the Qing and Japanese rule, namely Zhongyuan Village (today’s Zhongyuanli). The Yonghe Road in today’s Zhonghe District comes from this, but it is different from this district and not related.
I’m not saying American system is bad or whatever, I’m saying that American system is designed for America and Americans. Whether or not they will work elsewhere is not guaranteed.
They need to design a system for Taiwan and Taiwanese, not copy America’s suburbia concept, because Taiwan and most other countries in the world don’t really have the real estate to do it. It might work in Russia because they got a ton of space. Suburbia would never work in Taiwan, too many people, too little land. But we’ve also copied American industrialist tendencies so everyone competes like hell and therefore it’s always “me first”, hence the traffic issues.
I remembered wrong. They were planning for the entire project, which included both Yonghe and Zhonghe, to be a garden city, pioneered by British urban planner Ebenezer Howard. So it wouldn’t necessarily have been like the American suburbs, but it definitely had a lot more parks planned. In fact, 7 large parks were planned for Yonghe, but now only 1.5 of those originally planned parks survived.
Oh how I wish that was the case… After 26 years of being in the US and spending most of my life in actual suburbs in quiet single family homes, with a garage and central HVAC, and being able to comfortably drive a larger SUV (Ford Explorer), coming to Taiwan is quite the adjustment… No car, I’m kinda near a major intersection, and in a condo where my mom can somehow withstand 85°F (29°C) without air conditioning when my thermostat and car’s climate control stayed between 68-72°F (20-22°C).
Taiwan does not have the real estate to do American suburb. Taiwan either needs to be about 10 times larger without any mountains, or the population needs to be too low to sustain any industrial output. If this happens taiwanese wouldn’t be able to afford the suburban lifestyle.
It’s been recorded as 尫子上天 since the Japanese map. Written differently from 尪子上天 on google maps. There Wanli was still written in the Aboriginal name of 萬里加投 Palikataw.
