China in Brief
China has one of the world's oldest civilizations and has the oldest continuous civilization. It has archaeological evidence dating
back over 5,000 years. China had the largest economy for most of the last two millenia; until the 1850s when it missed the industrial revolution. Subsequently, imperialism, wars and civil wars damaged the country and its economy for most of the twentieth century. In the 1970s, economic reforms transformed the country and made it one of the major economic powers once again. China is viewed as the source of many major inventions. It has one of the world's oldest written language systems.
Historically, China's cultural sphere has extended across East Asia as a whole, with Chinese religion, customs, and writing systems being adopted to varying degrees by neighbors such as Japan, Korea and Vietnam. The first evidence of human presence in the region was found at the Zhoukoudian cave and is one of the first known specimens of Homo erectus, now commonly known as the Peking Man, estimated to have lived from 300,000 to 780,000 years ago
The first recorded use of the word "China" is dated 1555. It is derived from Cin, a Persian name for China popularized in Europe by Marco Polo. In early usage, "china" as a term for porcelain was spelled differently than the name of the country, the two words being derived from separate Persian words.[13] Both these words and the Sanskrit word for China (चीन) are ultimately derived from the Chinese word Qín, the name of the dynasty that ruled China from 221 to 206 B.C.The official name of China changed with each dynasty. The common name is Zhōngguó (中國 in traditional Chinese or 中国 in simplified Chinese). This translates as "central nation" or (traditionally) as "middle kingdom".
