CHINAN or TSINAN, a large and historic city and the capital of the province of Shantung in North China, 36° 43' N., '16° 37' E. Chinan is situated at the northern base of the ancient Highlands of Shantung (near Tai-shan the sacred mountain) where they sink beneath the alluvium of the Yellow river, and along an important spring-line which fostered very early settle ment. Its early history is bound up with that of the ancient states of Chi and Lu in the classical (Chou) period and when the present province of Shantung—closely corresponding to the territory of the two feudal states—was created under the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) Chinan, a natural focus of mountain and plain, was selected as administrative centre. The strategic and economic significance of its site near the main route between Peking and the Yangtze Delta, followed by the Grand Canal, has been much enhanced in recent times. The last great change in the lower course of the Yellow river in 1854 brought it within five miles of the city which controls the long bridge over it carry ing the north to south Tientsin–Pukow Railway (completed in . This railway runs parallel to, and fulfils the function once served by, the now dilapidated Grand Canal. Chinan is the junction of this arterial railway with the Shantung Railway run ning eastwards by way of the Poshan Coalfield to the port of Tsingtao on Kiaochow Bay which from 1898 until 1915 was leased territory in control of Germany and then fell into the hands of Japan. Although by the Shantung Treaty, arranged at the time of the Washington Conference (1922), Japan on certain condi tions surrendered Tsingtao to China, her influence and interests in the Shantung Railway are still very strong, as was shown by the despatch of Japanese troops to Chinan in 1928, when the Nationalist armies were advancing northwards. In contact with foreign influences along the two railways, in communication with the sea by a canal fed from the local springs and the market for one of the richest parts of the Great Plain, Chinan has been much affected by Western industrial methods, seen especially in flour milling and cotton manufacture. The city was voluntarily opened to foreign commerce in 1904 and a large "settlement" has grown up in the .Shang-pu or trading quarter, outside the west gate of the city. The population is approximately 300,000. In Chinan is situated the Shantung Christian University, one of the largest Union Universities in China and one of the chief centres of medical training.