Wu

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

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈwuː/

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^[1], →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on May 10, 2017, World‎^[2]:

        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^[3], →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 24 May 2015, Travel‎^[4]:

        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.
      • 1977, Yee Chiang, “Kuei-lin and Yang-shuo”, in China Revisited‎^[5], New York: W. W. Norton & Company, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 155:

        I deeply regretted having to miss seeing Hsing-ping, a very old town built by the ruler of the Wu Kingdom in the Three Kingdoms period of the third century.

   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

• (Suzhou): Gusu, Helu City, Suzhou
• (county): Wuxian, Wuhsien, Wu-hsien
• (commandery): Wujun, Wu-chun
• (language family): Wu Chinese, Jiangnan, Wuyue, Jiangzhe
• (Spring & Autumn Period realm): Gou Wu, Gouwu, Gong Wu, Gongwu
• (Three Kingdoms realm): Dong Wu, Dongwu, Eastern Wu, Sun Wu
• (Ten Kingdoms realm ruled from Yangzhou): Huainan, Hongnong, Southern Wu, Yang Wu
• (Ten Kingdoms realm ruled from Hangzhou): Wuyue
• (surname): Woo

Translations

one of the families of the Chinese language

• Arabic: وُو m (wū)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 吳語 / 吴语 (zh) (Wúyǔ), 吳方言 / 吴方言 (Wúfāngyán)

  Wu: 吳語 / 吴语, 吳方言 / 吴方言, 江浙話 / 江浙话

• Finnish: wu-kiina (fi)
• French: wu (fr) m
• Japanese: 呉語 (ja) (ごご, gogo)
• Korean: 우어(吳語) (ueo)
• Russian: у (ru) m (u)
• Thai: ภาษาจีนอู๋
• Vietnamese: tiếng Ngô

Chinese surname

• Arabic: وُو (wū)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 吳 / 吴 (zh) (Wú), 伍 (zh) (Wǔ)

  Wu: 吳 / 吴 (Wu⁶), 伍 (Ng⁶, Wu⁶)

• Finnish: Wu (fi)
• Japanese: 吳 (ja) (ご, Go), ウー (Ū)
• Korean: 오(吳) (ko) (O), 우 (ko) (U)
• Russian: У (ru) (U)
• Vietnamese: Ngô (吳), Wu

See also

• Suzhounese
• ISO 639-3 code wuu (SIL)
• Ethnologue entry for Wu, wuu ⁠

• Wiktionary's coverage of Wu terms

Further reading

• Wu on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Etymology 2

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

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

• Woo (surname)
• Mo (surname)
• martial, war-like, etc. (royal epithet)

Etymology 3

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

Proper noun

Wu

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

Synonyms

• Woo, Wujiang

Translations

river

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 烏江 / 乌江 (Wūjiāng)

surname

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 烏 / 乌 (zh)

Further reading

• Saul B. Cohen, editor (1998), “Wu River”, in The Columbia Gazetteer of the World‎^[6], volume 3, New York: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 3493, column 3

Etymology 4

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

Proper noun

Wu

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

Synonyms

• Woo, Wushui

Translations

river

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 巫水

surname

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 巫 (zh)

Etymology 5

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

Proper noun

Wu

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

Synonyms

• Woo, Wushui

Translations

Translations

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 㵲水

Etymology 6

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

Proper noun

Wu

1. A surname from Chinese.

Synonyms

• Woo

Etymology 7

From Cantonese 胡 (wu⁴). Doublet of Hu.

Proper noun

Wu

1. A surname from Chinese.

Synonyms

• Woo

Anagrams

• UW

Indonesian

Alternative forms

Variant spellings

• (Teochew, Hokkien):
  • Aw
  • Auw
  • Hu
  • Hoo

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

• (Standard Tagalog)
  • IPA^(key): /ˈwu/ [ˈwu]
  • IPA^(key): /ʔu/ [ʔʊ] (Mandarin Pinyin-literate)
• Rhymes: -u
• Syllabification: Wu

Proper noun

Wu (Baybayin spelling ᜏᜓ)

1. a Chinese surname from Mandarin