yuan
Pluralyuan, yuans
- 1The basic unit of currency in China.
The company reported profits of several billion yuan last quarter.
Tourists can exchange their dollars for yuan at the airport bank.
Note
A coin named for its shape: Mandarin yuán comes from a word for "circle," the round coin being the piece of eight. Yen and won descend from the same character, so the three currencies share one word. The plural can stay unchanged (five yuan, 300 yuan a household) or take -s as yuans. Evans Fordyce Carlson, in 1940, explained it as "a Chinese dollar." The government branch is a different word entirely.
- 2A branch of the Republic of China’s government, which has five such divisions.
Comparable to splitting a state's powers among separate departments, except the division here is fivefold rather than the usual three.
Each yuan operates with considerable independence from the others.
Disputes between the executive and legislative yuan can stall reforms for months.
Note
A different word altogether from the currency: Mandarin yuàn, a separate character, so the two share only their romanized spelling. It belongs to the political vocabulary of Taiwan, where it usually follows the name of its function, as in the Executive Yuan and the Legislative Yuan, and is capitalized as part of that name. Lowercase, it is the general word for any such branch.
Practice
Can you tell the meanings of yuan apart? Answer 3 quick questions from this page, or write your own sentence and AI will check it.
Origins
This comes from Mandarin 元 (yuán), from 圓/圆 (yuán, "circle," then "round coin"), referring to the piece of eight. It is a doublet of yen and won, and compares to Japanese 円 (en) and Korean 원 (won).
This comes from Mandarin 院 (yuàn).