Why did Europeans once believe China and the mysterious land of Cathay were different?

Countries & Cities · Published 3 October 2026 Swipe more like this →

In short: For centuries, medieval travelers and mapmakers treated Cathay as a distant, legendary realm separate from China. This confusion persisted until Jesuit missionaries in the late 16th century realized the two names described the same empire. Today, the name survives only as a poetic relic and in modern corporate branding.

The name Cathay originates from the Khitan people, a nomadic group that ruled northern China during the Liao dynasty from 916 to 1125. As the term traveled westward through Central Asian and Muslim trade routes, it became the standard name for northern China in Europe. Meanwhile, southern China was often referred to as Mangi, a term adopted by the Mongols. Because Europeans reached the southern coast by sea and the north via overland routes, they initially assumed these were two distinct, unrelated territories.

The mystery began to unravel in the late 1500s when Jesuit missionaries, led by Matteo Ricci, arrived in Beijing. Ricci noticed that the geography described in Marco Polo's accounts matched the Ming Empire perfectly. Crucially, he met Muslim merchants in Beijing who confirmed they were living in the Great Cathay. To verify this, the Jesuits sent Bento de Góis on a grueling three-year overland expedition from 1603 to 1605. His journey confirmed that the destination of these trade routes was indeed China, effectively ending the search for a separate Cathay.

The final proof arrived in 1654 through a linguistic coincidence. The Dutch Orientalist Jacobus Golius met the Jesuit Martino Martini and recited the names of the 12 divisions of the day used by the 13th-century Persian astronomer Nasir al-Din al-Tusi to describe the 'Cathayan' calendar. Martini, who had lived in China, recognized the terms immediately. This alignment of astronomical data finally convinced European scholars that Cathay and China were one and the same, though the name Cathay lingered in literature and persists today in names like Cathay Pacific and Cathay United Bank.

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