Taipei

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The capital and largest city of Taiwan, located in the north of the island in East Asia
2. A major city in northern Taiwan that serves as the island's political and economic center
3. The principal metropolis of Taiwan, situated on the northern part of the island nation

Etymology: The name Taipei is a plain piece of geography, built from two Chinese words that mean exactly what they say. The first element, 臺 or 台 (tái), is a shortened form of Taiwan, and the second, 北 (běi), means "north." Put together, the name literally means "Taiwan north," a label for the northern part of the island and its principal city. The English form comes from the Wade–Giles romanization of Mandarin, the older system used to write Chinese sounds in the Latin alphabet before Hanyu Pinyin became standard. In Wade–Giles the name is written T'ai-pei, with the apostrophe marking the aspirated initial, and the word entered English in the 19th century. Under the later pinyin system it is written Taipei, which is the spelling English speakers know today.