Where does the southernmost tip of our country’s territory go to the Nansha Islands?

The southernmost tip of our country’s territory reaches the Zengmu Shoal in the Nansha Islands.

The southernmost point of the nine-dash line in the South my country Sea is the Zengmu Shoal. Zengmu Shoal is a coral reef with an area of ??approximately 2.12 square kilometers and is located underwater all year round.

Shoals refer to reefs of loose materials such as gravel and shells deposited under the water surface. According to the measurement of the South China Sea Institute of Oceanography, Chinese Academy of Sciences, the shallowest point of Zengmu Shoal is 17.5 meters from the water surface. Therefore, many photos on the Internet that use the island as Zengmu Shoal are incorrect. In the narrow sense, Zengmu Shoal is just a reef located in the South China Sea. In the broad sense, Zengmu Shoal includes Zengmu Reef Hill, Baxian Shoal and Lidi Shoal, which is a group of reefs.

Origin of the name of Zengmu Shoal

The English name of Zengmu Shoal is James Shoal. Shoal means shoal. James is said to be a name of the British to commemorate one of their so-called adventurers, James Brooke. , this James was named governor by the King of Brunei because he helped suppress the rebellion. Later, he unilaterally declared the establishment of the so-called Brooke Kingdom on the land near Zengmu Shoal. Therefore, the British marked the area near Zengmu Shoal as James Shoal on the nautical charts.

Around 1935, the French carried out geographical surveys in colonial Vietnam, dispatched military ships to the South China Sea many times, and unilaterally declared that the sovereignty of many islands and reefs belonged to them. At such a critical moment, the Nationalist Government urgently established a land and water map review committee and published the "Map of the Islands in the South China Sea" that year. However, the situation at that time was urgent and lacked information, and there was no ability to send a ship to investigate, so it used the British chart information. , transliterated Zengmu Ansha into Zengmutan for the first time, declaring that its sovereignty belongs to China.