Hunan is a province of China,located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River and south of Lake Dongting (hence the name Hunan,meaning "south of the lake").Hunan is sometimes called Xiang for short,after the Xiang River which runs through the province.
Hunan borders Hubei in the north,Jiangxi to the east,Guangdong to the south,Guangxi to the southwest,Guizhou to the west,and Chongqing to the northwest.The capital is Changsha.
History
Hunan entered the written history of China around 350 BC,when under the kings of the Zhou dynasty it became part of the State of Chu.Until then Hunan was a land of primeval forests,occupied by the ancestors of the modern Miao,Tujia,Dong and Yao peoples,but starting at this time and for hundreds of years thereafter it was a magnet for migration of Han Chinese from the north,who cleared most of the forests and began farming rice in the valleys and plains.To this day,many of the small villages in Hunan are named after the Han families which originally settled there.Migration from the north was especially prevalent during the Eastern Jin Dynasty and the Southern and Northern Dynasties Periods,when nomadic invaders overran the north.
During the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period,Hunan was home to its own independent regime,Ma Chu.
