Kirin

See also: kirin and kirîn

English

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Manchu ᡤᡳᡵᡳᠨ (girin).

Pronunciation

• enPR: kēʹrǐnʹ

Proper noun

Kirin

1. (dated) Synonym of Jilin (a province in northeastern China).
   • 1904, Alexander Hosie, Manchuria: Its People, Resources and Recent History‎^[1], New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, pages 11–12:

     A single caravan often numbers many as twenty large carts, each with a team of seven animals. In the best caravans, that is those which go into the provinces of Kirin and Hei-lung-chiang and into Mongolia, a team usually consists of a pony in the shafts and six tracing mules three abreast.

   • 1908, B. L. Putnam Weale, The Coming Struggle in Eastern Asia‎^[2], Macmillan and Co., Limited, pages 180–181:

     This trade had only begun to grow to considerable proportions in the later 'nineties, and, had not the Chinese Eastern Railway been built and Harbin founded, it is quite certain that steam flour-mills would have been erected by Russian speculators along the course of the Amur river to deal with the bulk cargoes of grain that were constantly being received from the Kirin province of Manchuria.

   • 1934, George Babock Cressey, China's Geographic Foundations: A Survey of the Land and Its People‎^[3], McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., →OCLC, page 122:

     During the present century, copper has been mined in Yunnan, Szechwan, Kansu, Sinkiang, Fukien, Liaoning, and Kirin; and deposits are known to be present in a number of other provinces.

   • 1979 April 8, “Wallposter in Kirin”, in Free China Weekly‎^[4], volume XX, number 13, Taipei, →ISSN, →OCLC, page 3:

     A “big-character” wall poster appearing in Changchun, Kirin Province, on Feb. 2, denounced the Chinese Communist regime’s crackdown on dissidents clamoring for human rights, an intelligence report from the Chinese mainland said April 3.

2. (dated) Synonym of Jilin (a city in the province of the same name).
   • 1904, H. J. Whigham, Manchuria and Korea‎^[5], New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, page 56:

     A simple example may be given to show the great advantage of railway transport in this country. In order to get from Kuan-cheng-tze to Kirin (a distance of eighty miles or so), we had to hire four carts to carry ourselves and our effects. The journey took three days and cost eighty roubles (£8) for cart hire alone. When the branch railway to Kirin is finished the same journey would take three hours, and the whole charge for ourselves and baggage could not exceed ten roubles (£1).

   • 1922, South Manchuria Railway, Manchuria: Land of Opportunities‎^[6], New York: Thomas F. Logan, page 46:

     Many sawmills are now in operation at Antung, at the mouth of the Yalu, and at Kirin on the Sungari River.

Further reading

• “Kirin, pn.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “Kirin”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “Kirin” in TheFreeDictionary.com, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.: Farlex, Inc., 2003–2024.

Etymology 2

Proper noun

Kirin

1. A surname.