Tai-pan

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This article is about the Cantonese term. For other uses, see Tai-Pan (disambiguation).

A tai-pan (Chinese: 大班; pinyin: Dàbān,[1] literally 'top class',[2] or 'big shot') is a senior business executive or entrepreneur operating in China or Hong Kong.

History

In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, tai-pans were foreign-born businessmen who headed large Hong trading houses such as Jardine, Matheson & Co. and Dent & Co. amongst others.

The first recorded use of the term in English is in the Canton Register of 28 October 1834.[3] Historical variant spellings include taepan (first appearance), typan, and taipan.[3] The term gained wide currency outside China after the publication of Somerset Maugham's 1922 short story "The Taipan" and James Clavell's 1966 novel Tai-Pan.

Taipans

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Andrew J. Moody, "Transmission Languages and Source Languages of Chinese Borrowings in English", American Speech, Vol. 71, No. 4 (Winter, 1996), pp. 414-415.
  2. ↑ 汉英词典 — A Chinese-English Dictionary 1988 新华书店北京发行所发行 (Beijing Xinhua Bookshop).
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Oxford English Dictionary (2nd edn, 1989).
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