Hainan (; pinyin: ) is the smallest province of the People's Republic of China, located off the southern coast of the country. It consists of several islands, the largest of which is also called Hainan Island (Hainan Dao). When speaking of "Hainan" in Chinese, it is usually the main Hainan Island that is referred to. The PRC government claims Hainan's territories to extend to the southern Spratly Islands, Paracel Islands and other disputed marine territory. Hainan is also known as the largest Special Economic Zone laid out by Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping in the late 1980s.

History

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Hainan Island was called the Pearl Cliffs (珠崖 Zhūyá), Fine Jade Cliffs (瓊崖 Qióngyá), and the Fine Jade Land (瓊州 Qióngzhōu). The latter two gave rise to the province's abbreviation, Qióng (琼 in Simplified Chinese), referring to the greenery cover on the island.

Hainan first enters written Chinese history in 110 BC, when the Han Dynasty established a military garrison there. Settlement by mainlanders was slow however and from early on the island was considered to be fit only for exiles. It was in this period that the Li people arrived from Guangxi Province and displaced the island's aboriginal Austronesian-speaking peoples.

In Wu Kingdom of the Three Kingdoms Period, Hainan was the Zhuya Commandery (珠崖郡).

Under the Song Dynasty, Hainan came under the control of Guangxi Province, and for the first time large numbers of Han Chinese arrived, settling mostly in the north. Under the Yuan Dynasty (AD 1206-1368) it became an independent province, but was placed under Guangdong Province during the Ming Dynasty in 1370. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, large numbers of Han from Fujian and Guangdong began migrating to Hainan, pushing the Li into the highlands in the southern half of the island. In the eighteenth century, the Li rebelled against the government, which responded by bringing in mercenaries from the Miao people regions of Guizhou Province. Many of the Miao settled on the island and their descendants live in the western highlands to this day.

Hainan was made an independent province again in 1912 under the name Ch'iung-yai Island, but by 1921 it was incorporated once more into Guangdong Province. During the 1920s and 30s Hainan was a hotbed of Communist activity, especially after a bloody crackdown in Shanghai, the Republic of China in 1927 drove many Communists into hiding. The Communists and the Li natives fought a vigorous guerrilla campaign against the Japanese occupation of 1939-45, but in retaliation over one third of the male population were killed by the Japanese. After the Japanese surrender in 1945 the Nationalist Party (KMT) re-established control. Hainan was one of the last areas of China controlled by the Republic of China. From March to May 1950, the Landing Operation on Hainan Island (Chinese: 海南島登陸戰役; Pinyin: Hǎinándǎo Dēnglù Zhànyì) captured the island for the Chinese communists.

The Communists resumed development of the island along the lines established by the Japanese, but the results were limited by the island's isolation, its humid and typhoon-prone climate,...