Wu

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See also: -wü, wu, wu-, wú, wù, wū, and wǔ

English

Pronunciation

Etymology 1

Romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of Chinese 吳 / 吴 (Wú). Doublet of O.

Proper noun

Wu

  1. (historical) Suzhou, a city in southern Jiangsu province in China, whence:
    1. (historical) A county of imperial and Republican China around Suzhou.
    2. (historical) A commandery of imperial China around Suzhou.
  2. A historic and cultural region of China around the mouth of the Yangtze River, whence:
    1. The family of Chinese languages spoken in that region, including Shanghainese and Suzhounese, the second-most spoken family after Mandarin.
      • 2005 July 10, Howard W. French, “Uniting China to Speak Mandarin, the One Official Language: Easier Said Than Done”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on May 10, 2017, World‎:
        Linguists say the Wu dialect widely spoken in Shanghai, to take one prominent example, shares only about 31 percent lexical similarity with Mandarin, or roughly the same as English and French.
        The encounter at the Datian market began when the dumpling seller approached the foreigner with a phrase that sounded like "goodbye" in the Wu dialect. Knowing it must mean something else, the foreigner guessed she was asking his name, and provided it, producing a laugh from the woman who explained, switching to Mandarin, that she had asked if he had eaten lately.
    2. (historical) The kingdom ruled by the Ji family from Wuxi and then Suzhou during the Spring and Autumn period of China's Zhou dynasty.
      • 1984 June 3, Christopher S. Wren, “WHERE THE CHINESE GARDEN BLOOMS”, in The New York Times‎, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 24 May 2015, Travel‎:
        The finest private gardens were built in Suzhou, a graceful old city with a network of canals and a cultured ambiance. It was founded in the sixth century B.C. as the capital of the kingdom of Wu and flourished as a center of trade and scholarship under successive dynasties.
    3. A common surname from Chinese:
    4. (historical) The kingdom ruled by the Sun family from Ezhou and Nanjing during the Three Kingdoms interregnum following China's Han dynasty.
    5. (historical) The kingdom ruled by Li Zitong from Yangzhou and Hangzhou during the interregnum following China's Sui dynasty.
    6. (historical) The kingdom ruled by the Yang family from Yangzhou during the Ten Kingdoms interregnum following China's Tang dynasty.
    7. (historical) The kingdom ruled by the Qian family from Hangzhou and Shaoxing during the Ten Kingdoms interregnum following China's Tang dynasty.
Synonyms
Translations

See also

Further reading

Etymology 2

Romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of Chinese 武 (Wǔ, “war, warrior, warlike”).

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Proper noun

Wu

  1. A surname from Chinese.
  2. (historical) An epithet of numerous kings and emperors in Chinese history who were honored with variants of the posthumous name Wuwang or Wudi.
Usage notes

Although the Chinese usage of Wu as a posthumous name is adjectival and should properly be translated—as, e.g., "the Martial Emperor of the Han dynasty"—or treated as an epithet in a similar manner to emperors called after their era names—as, e.g., "the Hongwu Emperor of the Ming dynasty"—it is much more common to encounter them in English sources treated as proper names—as, e.g., "Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty"—despite the Chinese meaning nothing of the sort.

Synonyms

Etymology 3

Romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of Chinese 烏 / 乌 (Wū or Wù, “crow, raven, black”).

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Proper noun

Wu

  1. A river in Guizhou, China, a tributary of the Yangtze.
  2. A surname from Chinese.
Synonyms
Translations

Further reading

Etymology 4

Romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of Chinese 巫 (Wū or Wú, “shaman, sorceror, witch”).

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia
English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Proper noun

Wu

  1. A river in Hunan, China, a tributary of the Yuan.
  2. A surname from Chinese.
Synonyms
Translations

Etymology 5

Romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of Chinese 㵲 (Wǔ).

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Proper noun

Wu

  1. A river in Hunan, China, a tributary of the Yuan.
Synonyms
Translations
Translations

Etymology 6

The romanization of the Mandarin pronunciation of various other Chinese surnames: 伍 (Wǔ), 仵 (Wǔ), 鄔／邬 (Wū).

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Proper noun

Wu

  1. A surname from Chinese.
Synonyms

Etymology 7

From Cantonese 胡 (wu4). Doublet of Hu.

English Wikipedia has an article on:
Wikipedia

Proper noun

Wu

  1. A surname from Chinese.
Synonyms

Anagrams

Indonesian

Alternative forms

Variant spellings

Etymology

From Cantonese 胡 (Hú).

Proper noun

Wu

  1. a surname from Cantonese

Tagalog

Etymology

Borrowed from Mandarin 吳／吴 (Wú) and 伍 (Wǔ). Doublet of Go, Ngo, Goh, Cinco, and Ng.

Pronunciation

Proper noun

Wu (Baybayin spelling ᜏᜓ)

  1. a Chinese surname from Mandarin
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