The People's Republic of China (PRC), known officially as Zhōnghuá (中华), has a lengthy coastline, many large harbors, and a large number of lighthouses. The country is divided into 23 provinces and 11 other province-level regions of various special types.The province of Fújiàn (formerly spelled Fukien
or Fuchien) is located on the southeastern coast of the country, facing
Taiwan across the Taiwan Strait. The coastline is rugged
and irregular with many islands and reefs threatening unwary navigators.
Fújiàn is divided into nine prefectural-level cities, six of them facing the coast. This page covers the prefectural-level city of Quánzhōu on the central coast of the province.
Quánzhōu is a major metropolitan area with a population of more than 8 million.
The People's Republic claims the Jīnmén (Kinmen, Quemoy) Islands as part of Quánzhōu, but those islands have been
under the administration of the Republic of China government on Taiwan
since 1949. The lighthouses of Kinmen are described on the Matsu
and Kinmen page.
Lighthouses in China are maintained by the PRC
Maritime Safety Administration. The administration is organized
in four regional administrations with district offices in the major
ports. All the lights on this page are maintained by the Xiàmén MSA
office, which is part of the Shànghǎi Region.
There are many languages and dialects spoken in China, but Standard Chinese, often called Mandarin, is official. The pīnyīn system for transliterating Standard Chinese into Latin characters is
now the international standard but some locations continue to be known
also under the spellings of older transliteration systems. The Chinese word for a lighthouse is dēngtǎ (灯塔). In Standard Chinese jiāo (formerly chiao) is a reef or rock, jiǎo is a cape or headland, dǎo (tao)
is an island; yǔ (tsu) or tuózi ("lump") is a small island, hǎi is a sea, wān is a bay, hǎixiá is a strait, hé or jiāng is a river, hékǒu ("river mouth") is an estuary, and gǎng (kang) is a harbor.
ARLHS numbers are from the ARLHS
World List of Lights. CN numbers are the MSA List of Lights (助航标志表) numbers. Admiralty numbers are from volume
P of the Admiralty List of Lights & Fog Signals. U.S. NGA List
numbers are from Publication 112.
- General Sources
- Online List of Lights - China - Taiwan Strait
- Photos by various photographers posted by Alexander Trabas.
- Chinese English Pinyin Dictionary
- A useful tool for juggling the representations of Chinese names.
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Yǒngníngzuǐ Light, Shíshī
PRC Maritime Safety Administration Xiàmén Office photo
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