Celestial Empire

English

Etymology

Calque of Literary Chinese 天朝 (Tiāncháo).

Proper noun

the Celestial Empire

1. Empire of China
   • 1912, Arthur Henderson Smith, “Uplifting Leaders”, in The Uplift of China‎^[1], →OCLC, page 117:

     Had it not been for the casual discovery in the year 1625 of a deeply buried black marble tablet near Hsi-an containing nearly 1,700 Chinese characters, and a long list of names of priests in Syriac, the fact that such a sect rooted itself in the Celestial Empire would never have been believed, as indeed after the tablet was unearthed it was for a long time discredited.

   • 1991, Chris Mullin, The Year of the Fire Monkey‎^[2] (Fiction), London: Chatto & Windus, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 252:

     LIKE THE MANDARINS of old, the rulers of China live behind high walls. When they emerge, which they rarely do, they travel in cars with rear windows curtained like sedan chairs.
     They live in the Chung Nan Hai, a walled park adjacent to the Forbidden City from where ancient dynasties ruled the Celestial Empire.

Synonyms

• Cathay
• China
• Empire of China

Derived terms

• celestial (a person from the Celestial Empire)

Translations

Empire of China

• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 天朝 (tin¹ ciu⁴)

  Mandarin: 天朝 (zh) (Tiāncháo)

• French: Céleste-Empire (fr) m, Empire Céleste m
• German: himmlisches Reich
• Japanese: please add this translation if you can
• Korean: 천조국 (cheonjoguk)
• Russian: Поднебе́сная (ru) f (Podnebésnaja)
• Spanish: Imperio celeste m
• Ukrainian: Піднебе́сна f (Pidnebésna)