Hunan

Hunan (Chinese: 湖南; pinyin: Húnán; listen) is a province of South Central China, in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and south of Lake Dongting (The characters in the name Hunan mean "lake" and "south"^[1]). Hunan is sometimes called 湘 (pinyin: Xiāng) for short, after the Xiang River which runs through the province.

Its major cities are Changde, Changsha, Chenzhou, Hengyang, Huaihua, Loudi, Shaoyang, Xiangtan, Yiyang, Yongzhou, Yueyang, Zhangjiajie and Zhuzhou.

1. ↑ (in Chinese) Origin of the Names of China's Provinces Archived 2016-04-27 at the Wayback Machine, People's Daily Online.