The Min River (;

Foochow Romanized Foochow Romanized, also known as Bàng-uâ-cê (BUC for short; ) or Hók-ciŭ-uâ Lò̤-mā-cê (), is a Latin alphabet for the Fuzhou dialect of Eastern Min adopted in the middle of the 19th century by Western missionaries. It had varied at d ...

: ''Mìng-gĕ̤ng'';

Pe̍h-ōe-jī (; ; ), also sometimes known as the Church Romanization, is an orthography used to write variants of Southern Min Chinese, particularly Taiwanese and Amoy Hokkien. Developed by Western missionaries working among the Chinese diaspora in Sout ...

: Bân-kang;

Kienning Colloquial Romanized The Kienning Colloquial Romanized Alphabet (建寧府土腔羅馬字, ) is a romanization system adopted by Western missionaries to compile the Kienning dialect (modern day Jian'ou City) of the Northern Min language in the Fujian Province of C ...

: Ma̿ing-gó̤ng) is a -long

river A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of ...

Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its ...

province, People's Republic of China. It is the largest river in Fujian, and an important

water transport Maritime transport (or ocean transport) and hydraulic effluvial transport, or more generally waterborne transport, is the transport of people ( passengers) or goods (cargo) via waterways. Freight transport by sea has been widely used th ...

channel. Most of northern and central Fujian is within its drainage area. The provincial capital,

Fuzhou Fuzhou (; , Fuzhounese: Hokchew, ''Hók-ciŭ''), alternately romanized as Foochow, is the capital and one of the largest cities in Fujian province, China. Along with the many counties of Ningde, those of Fuzhou are considered to constitute ...

, sits on the lower Min River, with its historic center being on the northern side of the river, even closer to its fall into the

East China Sea The East China Sea is an arm of the Western Pacific Ocean, located directly offshore from East China. It covers an area of roughly . The sea’s northern extension between mainland China and the Korean Peninsula is the Yellow Sea, separated ...

; the location historically made it an important port.

Alternate sources

The traditional source of the Min River is in the far northwest of the basin, hence in China the highest reach is called the Beixi Brook. The total length of the river using this source is 505 km. But in fact, the Beixi is neither the geographic or hydrological source of the river. The Shuiqian is the furthest geographic source, and the Shuiqian-Shaxi-Min is 580 km long. A different river, the Jinxi, is larger than the Beixi-Futun at the point where the two meet, and consequently is connected to the hydrological source.

References

1. Fujian Local Records Compilation Committee. (2001). ''Fujian Provincial Chronicles: Topography.'' Fuzhou: Local Records Press Rivers of Fujian {{China-river-stub

Alternate sources

See also

References