Manchuria

name

Etymology: Probably originally a backformation from Manchurian (“of or relating to the Manchus”), from Dutch Mansiourische, from Mansiouwer (“a Manchu”) + -isch (“-ish: forming adjectives”), possibly as a calque of Japanese 満州 (まんしゅう, Manshū, “Manchuria; Manchurian”). Equivalent to New Latin and English Manchu + -ia, with the r added for ease of pronunciation under the influence of names like Etruria, Liguria, &c. Cf. French Mandchourie, German Mandschurei, &c. Further popularized by Philipp von Siebold's early-19th-century Dutch translations of Japanese maps employing the term, replacing the earlier and vaguer Tartary, Eastern Tartary, Chinese Tartary, &c.

1. A region of northeastern China comprising the three provinces of Liaoning, Jilin, and Heilongjiang and the northeastern part of Inner Mongolia.

   “The senior Japanese commanders and all ground, sea, air and auxiliary forces within Manchuria, Korea north of 38 north latitude and Karafuto shall surrender to the Commander in Chief of Soviet Forces in the Far East. (General Order No. 1, 1945)”

   “Negotiating with Stalin was like dealing with an octopus. At Yalta it had been agreed that Dairen in China would be an open port that the Chinese could use. And now they were trying- it'd be under the control of the Chinese, that the Russians could use is what I intended to say. And, it was now an approach, by Stalin, that would have given him complete possession of that part of Manchuria. And that, I wasn't in favor of doing.[...]Dairen would be administered by the Chinese, as a Chinese port, but it would be a free port that everybody could use including the Russians.”

2. The area traditionally inhabited by the Manchu people and their Jurchen predecessors, in modern China and Russia.

   “The east coast of Manchuria is generally high and rocky.”

   “In 1866, Her Majesty’s ship Scylla, Captain Courtenay, left Nagasaki, Japan, on the 20th of July, with orders to visit the different Russian settlements on the coast of Manchuria, and we are indebted to the Rev. W. V. Lloyd for an excellent account of the trip, given in the thirty-seventh volume of the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society—an account which is further illustrated by a map of Russian Manchuria.”

3. Synonym of Manchukuo: a former puppet state of Imperial Japan.