Maybe some of you don’t realize, that the fact about these three words having same meaning, which just different language or pronounciation. They are Japan, Nihon and Nippon, which mean (still) Japan, hehehe. And just wondering, how those words even came up until these days. When we always use the words Japan, like in every part of our live, such as Japan Vehicle, Japan Sushi, Japan Anime, Japan Manga, Japan Language, Japan Kanji Words, JapanPOP (JPOP), Japan PSP, Japan Game, Japan Culture and so on. So, what are they? Literally, Nihon, or Nippon means ‘the sun’s origin’, that is where the sun originated, and derived from that often translated as ‘Land of the Rising Sun’.
Well, trough history which start in the dawn of the Chinese Tang Dinasty, in 670 A.D., to be precise. When Japanese scholar who go studied abroad to China created a new name for their motherland using Chinese phrase for “origin of the sun, sunrise”, because Japan is located in east of China. The phrase was nzyet-pwun. And this Japanese scholar added the Chinese suffix – kwuk, which mean “country”, deferring a combine nzyet-pwun-kwuk, meaning “sun-origin-country”, or “land of the rising sun”. But the consonant bands in the word were not pronounceable in Old Japanese Language, so the style was simplified to Nip-pon-gu or *Ni-pon-gu, and later acquiring by regular sound change or Japanese pronounciation to Ni-hon-gu. And the forms Nippon and Nihon of today are the same as these, less the suffix – gu, “country”. And what comes more interesting that the Chinese themselves took to calling japan by the name that the Japanese scholar’s had invented. By Chinese Mandarin, the phrase was developed to Rìbenguó, and when Marco Polo came, it work out to be Chipangu, well because Italian spelling some weird words for their pronounciation, which he would have pronounced as (chi-pän-gu) or (shi-pän-gu). Then Malay absorbed it from early Mandarin language turn out to be as Japang, and we, the Indonesian, which share same in common with the Malayan, called with Jepang. And also from Portuguese traders encountered in 16th Century in Maluku ( Moluccas). When they brought out from Europe, when it is recorded for the first time in English in 1577, derived from what Marco Polo gave as souvenir back from Far East, spelled Giapan. Then developed, comes English version for, Japan.
Well, trough history which start in the dawn of the Chinese Tang Dinasty, in 670 A.D., to be precise. When Japanese scholar who go studied abroad to China created a new name for their motherland using Chinese phrase for “origin of the sun, sunrise”, because Japan is located in east of China. The phrase was nzyet-pwun. And this Japanese scholar added the Chinese suffix – kwuk, which mean “country”, deferring a combine nzyet-pwun-kwuk, meaning “sun-origin-country”, or “land of the rising sun”. But the consonant bands in the word were not pronounceable in Old Japanese Language, so the style was simplified to Nip-pon-gu or *Ni-pon-gu, and later acquiring by regular sound change or Japanese pronounciation to Ni-hon-gu. And the forms Nippon and Nihon of today are the same as these, less the suffix – gu, “country”. And what comes more interesting that the Chinese themselves took to calling japan by the name that the Japanese scholar’s had invented. By Chinese Mandarin, the phrase was developed to Rìbenguó, and when Marco Polo came, it work out to be Chipangu, well because Italian spelling some weird words for their pronounciation, which he would have pronounced as (chi-pän-gu) or (shi-pän-gu). Then Malay absorbed it from early Mandarin language turn out to be as Japang, and we, the Indonesian, which share same in common with the Malayan, called with Jepang. And also from Portuguese traders encountered in 16th Century in Maluku ( Moluccas). When they brought out from Europe, when it is recorded for the first time in English in 1577, derived from what Marco Polo gave as souvenir back from Far East, spelled Giapan. Then developed, comes English version for, Japan.
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