Located at the southern tip of the Liaodong Peninsula, Dalian is a sub-provincial city of Liaoning Province and an important coastal central city in northern China, which is very important in both economic and strategic position.
In fact, Dalian was originally a small fishing village, the village name was "Three Mountains", during the Tang Dynasty was known as "Sanshanpu", "Qingnipu", in the Ming Dynasty was called "Qingniwa", in the middle and late Qing Dynasty, it was called "Dalian Bay", until 1905, it was named "Dalian".
So, how did the name "Dalian" come about? There are four theories.
The first theory is that it got its name because of its shape.
During the Ming and Qing dynasties to the Republic of China, due to the floods in Guannei, there was a famous population migration, and a large number of refugees from Shandong and Zhizhi came to Guanwai from thousands of miles away and opened up new settlements, known in history as "breaking into the Guandong".
At that time, immigrants were dragging their families and carrying a lot of luggage, and in order to carry more things, almost everyone used a cloth pocket called "folding". The mouth of this cloth pocket is open in the middle, the two ends are filled with things, the large folds can be directly put on the shoulders, and the small ones can be hung on the waist, so that the hands are freed to the greatest extent and it is convenient to do more things.
When everyone came to this place in Dalian Bay, they found that the shape of Sanshan Island outside Dalian Bay resembled the folds on their bodies, so they called Dalian Bay "Dalian Bay", and later gradually became "Dalian Bay", and the towns in this area were also called "Dalian".
The second theory is derived from the Russian transliteration.
In 1898, the Qing government was forced to sign the Treaty of The Brigade Lease with Tsarist Russia, and the seven-year-long history of the Tsarist Russian colony in the Dalian area began. After becoming a Tsarist colony, Tsar Nicholas II named the area around The Green Mud Depression "Darini", which means "city far away" in Russian.
Later, the Russo-Japanese War broke out, and by the end of the war in 1905, Japan had achieved the final victory, so Tsarist Russia transferred Dalian to Japan, and Dalian became a Japanese colony.
At that time, the name of Dalian "Darini" was russian, and the Japanese Liaodong Garrison Command ordered a new name, because "Darini" reads very much like "Dalian" in Chinese, and there is also a Chinese character phrase of "Dalian" in Japanese, so from 1905, "Darini" was renamed "Dalian".
The third version is based on the Manchu pronunciation.
After the Qing Dynasty unified the Central Plains, Manchu replaced Chinese as the official language, and the military affairs and domestic and foreign affairs at that time were recorded by Manchu. Because Dalian is near the sea, the Manchu language calls the seashore or the land near the coast "Dalin", and over time, it is called "Dalian" according to the harmonic pronunciation of "Dalian".
There is also a fourth theory, that Dalian Bay is rich in oysters, the locals call it sea oysters, because the oysters produced are large and good, so the fishermen who come and go call this place "Da oyster bay", and later feel that the name is not elegant enough, so they changed it to "Dalian".
No matter which statement is correct, it shows that Dalian is a place with a long history and profound heritage, and today's Dalian is a famous port city and tourist city in the north, and dalian ranks 16th in the "2019 China Top 100 Cities Ranking".