Kunlun

See also: K'un-lun and Kūnlún

English

A peak in the Kunlun range (1871)

Alternative forms

• Kun Lun, K'un-lun, Kuen Lun, Kwenlun

Etymology

From the Mandarin 崑崙／昆仑 (Kūnlún) and 崑崙山／昆仑山 (Kūnlún Shān), with the character 山 (shān) being an ambiguous reference to any raised place, inclusive of islands, hills, mountains, and mountain ranges. The characters 崑崙／昆仑 (Kūnlún) are phono-semantic compounds adding 山 (shān) as a semantic component (形旁 (xíngpáng)) to the characters 昆 (kūn) and 侖／仑 (lún), which were presumably also homophones for Kunlun in Old Chinese—Zhengzhang's reconstructed pronunciation being /*kuːn.run/—but leaving its further development or original meaning uncertain. See also the Name section of the Wikipedia entry on the mythological Kunlun.

Pronunciation

• enPR: ko͝onʹlo͝onʹ

Proper noun

Kunlun

1. A mountain range in China forming the border between the Tarim Basin to its north and the Tibetan Plateau to its south, extending across the Chinese provinces of Xinjiang, Tibet, and Qinghai.
   • [1625, Samuel Purchas, Pvrchas His Pilgrimes‎^[1], volume III, London, →OCLC, page 340:

     That Riuer of Nanquin which I called (Yamſu or) Ianſu, the ſonne of the Sea, goeth Northward to Nanquin, and then returning ſomewhat Southward, runneth into the Sea with great force ; fortie myles from which it paſſeth by Nanquin. And that from hence to Pequin there might bee paſſage by Riuers, the Kings of China haue deriued a large Channell from this to another Riuer, called the Yellow Riuer, ſuch being the colour of that troubled water. This is the other famous Riuer of that Kingdome, in greatneſſe and note, which ariſesth without the Kingdome to the Weſt, out of the Hill Cunlun, conjectured * to bee the ſame whence Ganges ariſeth, or one neere to it.]

   • 1822, C. Bernard Rutley, “Zong”, in The Forbidden Land‎^[2], Blackie & Son, →OCLC, page 90:

     Crossing the Altyn Tagh had proved hard enough, but no sooner had the travellers left those mountains behind and crossed the border into Tibet than they had plunged into the recesses of the Kunlun Mountains.

   • 1944, Bernhard Haurwitz, James M. Austin, “Asia (Including Russia)”, in Climatology‎^[3], McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., →OCLC, page 269:

     Between the Himalaya and the Kunlun to the north lies the very high plateau of Tibet, which is traversed by a number of smaller mountain chains.

   • 1978, Hugh McLeave, A Borderline Case‎^[4], New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 148:

     Brodie lent only half an ear. He was eying the wall map, comparing it with what he had seen from the chopper. He picked out the three nearest towns—Yarkand, Karghalik, and Kokyar—running north to south. Everything inside a huge semicircle bounded on the west by the Yarkand River and the southeast by the Kunlun Mountains was shaded. That must be the barbed-wire zone guarded by the army.

   • 2014 August 30, “First ascent of Kokodak Dome”, in Deutsche Welle‎^[5], archived from the original on 09 August 2022‎^[6]:

     I joined an AMICAL expedition to the previous unclimbed 7129-meter-high Kokodak Dome, also known as Kokodak II. The peak is part of the Kongur Range in the Kunlun mountains in the region Xinjiang.

   • 2021 December 3, Liesl Schillinger, quoting Sylvain Tesson, “Books That Satisfy Your Yearning for Far-Off Places”, in The New York Times‎^[7], →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 03 December 2021, Travel‎^[8]:

     Observing Lake Yaniugol, rising high in the steppe, he writes: “It settled like a sacred host of jade upon the sand. It appeared to us at twilight, in the hollow of a ledge, flanked to the north by the sharp incisors of the Kunlun peaks soaring to 6,000 meters, and to the south by the Changtang. Behind this shimmering disk, the secret plateau.”

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:Kunlun.
2. (Chinese mythology) A mountain or mountain range somewhere west of the North China Plain believed to be the home of Xiwangmu and the Peaches of Immortality, as well as other gods and Taoist immortals, and previously believed to help support the dome of the sky.
   • 1625, Samuel Purchas, Pvrchas His Pilgrimes‎^[9], volume III, London, →OCLC, page 340:

     ...the Yellow Riuer... is the other famous Riuer of that Kingdome, in greatneſſe and note, which ariſesth without the Kingdome to the Weſt, out of the Hill Cunlun, conjectured to bee the ſame whence Ganges ariſeth, or one neere to it.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:Kunlun.

Translations

Chinese mountain range

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 崑崙／昆仑 (zh) (Kūnlún), 崑崙山／昆仑山 (zh) (Kūnlúnshān)

• Manchu: ᡴᡠᠨ
  ᠯᡠᠨ
  ᡧᠠᠨ
  ᠠᠯᡳᠨ (kun lun šan alin)

Mythological Chinese mountain or mountain range

• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 崑崙／昆仑 (zh) (Kūnlún), 崑崙山／昆仑山 (zh) (Kūnlúnshān)

• Manchu: ᡴᡠᠨ
  ᠯᡠᠨ
  ᡧᠠᠨ
  ᠠᠯᡳᠨ (kun lun šan alin)

Further reading

• Kunlun, Kun Lun, K'un-lun, K'unlun, Kun-lun, Kuen Lun, Kwenlun at the Google Books Ngram Viewer.
• “Kunlun Shan, pn.”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “Kunlun”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.
• “Kunlun” in TheFreeDictionary.com, Huntingdon Valley, Pa.: Farlex, Inc., 2003–2024.
• Saul B. Cohen, editor (1998), “Kunlun Mountains”, in The Columbia Gazetteer of the World‎^[10], volume 2, New York: Columbia University Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 1631, column 1: “Sometimes spelled Kwenlun Mts.”