CHONGQING (CQNEWS) -- “Chongqing's Qingmuguan, Cuntan and Egongyan are well-known, but few people know that these three names are not their real names...” Recently, a Chongqing historical and cultural writer Sima Qingshan, who is the vice president of Chongqing Culture and Tourism Association, released an interesting video about the stories of Chongqing's place names, in which he mentioned that Qingmuguan, Cuntan and Egongyan were not their original names.

For this, a reporter of Chongqing Evening News interviewed Sima Qingshan, who then told the interesting stories behind these place names.

The original name can be heard from Cuntan and Qingmuguan

Sima Qingshan first answer the origin of these place name stories: "In the process of sorting out the materials, I came across books about Chongqing's history and culture by old gentlemen such as Peng Botong, Li Zhengquan, etc. (Reporter's note: Peng Botong is an expert in Chongqing's literature and history, and Li Zhengquan is an expert in the research of Chongqing's place names), among which there are many stories about place names. I dug out these stories and told them in popular language, hoping to let everyone have more understanding of Chongqing."

When it came to Cuntan, which literally means Inch Beach, in Jiangbei District, Sima Qingshan admitted that the original name of this place was actually “Chengtan”, which literally means Steelyard Beach. Then he popularized the origin of Cuntan to the reporter: “In the past, there was a stone beam under the river, which would emerge in the dry season. It looked like a steelyard, so people call this place Chengtan. In Chongqing dialect, the pronunciation of ‘Cheng’ and ‘Cun’ is similar. For the sake of simplicity, the word ‘Cheng’ was written into the present word ‘Cun’, and then the Chengtan became the present Cuntan.”

The original name of Qingmuguan is "Qinmuguan", and the original name and current name are homophonic characters. Sima Qingshan revealed: “Legend has it that the homophonic sound of Qingmuguan came from Qinmuguan, because it was said that there was a young man to go home to visit his mother, and when he walked to Qingmuguan, he was caught by a python, which entangled him. He fought with this giant python to the death, but he still suffered misfortune. In memory of him, locals renamed this pass to Qinmuguan, meaning that the young man was going home to see his mother. Later, in the daily communication was rumored; Qinmuguan became the present Qingmuguan.”

The original name of Egongyan is strange

If the original names of Cuntan and Qingmuguan still have “sound” to follow, then the original name of Egongyan, Hegaoyan, is completely unfamiliar. According to Sima Qingshan, "The original name of Egongyan is Hegaoyan. This name comes from Gong Qinggao, a famous calligrapher, painter and poet in Chongqing. This person was so famous in the Qianlong period of Qing Dynasty that there was a saying in the folk at that time: “the family without Qinggao painting must be a vulgar family”. One day Gong Qinggao came to the riverside of Egongyan and found a flock of white cranes soaring on a hillside, with the surging Yangtze River flowing eastwards in the background. In a moment, he was poetically inspired and named the place Hegaoyan. "He” means white crane, “Gao” means small hill, and “Yan” means the local rocks, all of which together sounded very elegant.”

The original name of Egaoyan is Hegaoyan, for which reporters also found some corroborative materials from other channels. Baidu Baike has such an introduction to Xiejiawan Street: “In January 1954, Street 2 in Hegaoyan and Xiejiawan factory areas was built”. “In January, 1958, Street 2 of Hegaoyan and Xiejiawan factory area were merged into Xiejiawan Street.” At the same time, there is a Hegao Village under the Egongyan Bridge. The address of Jianchuan Museum is No. 1, Hegao Village, Xiejiawan Street, Jiulongpo District.

Sima Qingshan told reporters: “In fact, I have done an investigation before. In the materials of 1950s, it was said to plan to build Egongyan Yangtze River Bridge, when the name of the Bridge is Hegaoyan Yangtze River Bridge.”

Why did Hegaoyan finally become the Egongyan, which is not so homophonic? Sima Qingshan said: "This is a phenomenon often encountered in folklore, called Vulgarization of elegant Names. Because it is very troublesome to write three characters of “Hegaoyan”, and general knowledge level of former people was not high, a lot of people do not know how to write Hegaoyan, as a result, they made their own proposal to replacing it with the typo of stick figure instead, so the name was changed into Egongyan." (Translated by Li Yunlong, Fathom Language Limited)