China ' s word for China is . '' roughly means ' middle ', and '' means ' country '. The latter character is sort of a pictograph of a king or monarch constrained by borders , so ' the middle kingdom ' would be a good translation . It ' s called that partly out of a ' we are the center of the world ' arrogance China around the time of the Roman Empire did believe that they were the only civilized land in the entire world , and referred to any nonChinese as barbarians . It doesn ' t really mean that anymore , though most modern Chinese country names are just named phonetically . ' De guo ' is Germany ' Deutsch Country '. ' Fa guo ' is France , ' ying guo ' is England , ' mei guo ' is ' ahmeirica ', and ' jia na da ' is Canada . So , calling themselves is also based off of the idea that China lies directly beneath heaven , and directly above hell right in the middle . They use ' HeavenHell ' in the Greek sense though , so ' PantheonLand of the Dead ' is probably more accurate . Again though , obviously people don ' t quite buy that these days . But it is kind of interesting .