Chu (state)

Chu 楚 *s-r̥aʔ
c. 1030 BC – 223 BC
Chu (楚) c. 350 BC
Status	Viscounty (before 704 BC) Kingdom (704–223 BC)
Capital	Danyang[1] (丹陽)(c. 1030 – c. 680 BC) Ying (郢) (c. 680 – 278 BC) Chen (陳) (278–241 BC) Shouchun (壽春) (241–224 BC) Pengcheng
Religion	Chinese folk religion Ancestor veneration
Government	Monarchy
Historical era	Zhou dynasty
• Founded by Xiong Yi	c. 1030 BC
• Xiong Tong proclaimed king	706 or 703 BC
• Conquered by Qin	223 BC
Currency	Ancient Chinese coinage
Succeeded by Qin dynasty

Chu
"Chu" in seal script (top) and regular (bottom) Chinese characters
Chinese	楚
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Chǔ Bopomofo ㄔㄨˇ Wade–Giles Ch'u3 Tongyong Pinyin Chǔ IPA [ʈʂʰù] Wu Suzhounese Tshòu Yue: Cantonese Yale Romanization Chó Jyutping Co2 IPA [tsʰɔ˧˥] Southern Min Hokkien POJ Chhó͘ Tâi-lô Tshóo Middle Chinese Middle Chinese tʂʰjó Old Chinese Baxter (1992) *tsrhjaʔ Baxter–Sagart (2014) *s-r̥aʔ

Chu (Chinese: 楚; pinyin: Chǔ; Wade–Giles: Ch'u,^[2] Old Chinese: *s-r̥aʔ^[3]) was an ancient Chinese state during the Zhou dynasty. Their first ruler was King Wu of Chu in the early 8th century BC. Chu was located in the south of the Zhou heartland and lasted during the Spring and Autumn period. At the end of the Warring States period it was destroyed by the Qin in 223 BC during the Qin's wars of unification.

Also known as Jing (荊) and Jingchu (荊楚), Chu included most of the present-day provinces of Hubei and Hunan, along with parts of Chongqing, Guizhou, Henan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai. For more than 400 years, the Chu capital Danyang was located at the junction of the Dan and Xi Rivers^[4][5] near present-day Xichuan County, Henan, but later moved to Ying. The house of Chu originally bore the ancestral temple surname Nai (嬭 OC: /*rneːlʔ/) which was later written as Mi (芈 OC: /*meʔ/). They also bore the lineage name Yan (酓 OC: /*qlamʔ/, /*qʰɯːm/) which would later be written Xiong (熊 OC: /*ɢʷlɯm/).^[6][7]