Macau

Meaning

Macau (a city and special administrative region of China)

Hyphenated as

Ma‧cau

Gender

♂️ Masculine

Pronounced as (IPA)

/maˈkaw/

Etymology

From a southern seaward variety of Chinese, possibly Hokkien, possibly either 媽閣／妈阁 (Má Koh) or 媽港／妈港 (Má Káng), short for 阿媽港／阿妈港 (A-má Káng), from 阿媽／阿妈 (a-má, “grandma Mazu, patron goddess of sailors”) + 港 (káng, “port”), both referring to the A-Ma Temple (媽閣廟／妈阁庙) or Templo de A-Má in Portuguese, built in 1488 before the city of Macau came into being. The initial ⟨A⟩ was likely elided due to misconstruing with Portuguese a (“towards; to; at; in”). Compare Spanish Macán, Japanese 媽港(マカオ) (makao), Latin Machao.