Cathay known China under names similar to "Cathay", that country was known to the peoples of South-East Asia and India under names similar to "China" (cf. e.g. "Cina" in modern Malay). Meanwhile, in China itself, people usually referred to their nation state based on the name of the ruling dynasty, e.g. "Da Ming Guo" ("the kingdom of the Great Ming"), or as the "Middle Kingdom" ("Zhongguo" 中國); see also Names of China for details. When the Portuguese reached South-East Asia (Afonso de Albuquerque conquering Malacca in 1511) and the southern coast of China (Jorge Álvares reaching the Pearl River estuary in
Modern language of eight. International auxiliary languages are by definition not associated with a particular country or geographic region. Esperanto is probably the best-known and most widespread. Interlingua, a much less popular, but still growing auxiliary language, is likewise spoken mainly in Northern and Eastern Europe and in South America, with substantial numbers of speakers in Central Europe, Ukraine, and Russia. Other auxiliary languages include Occidental and Latino Sine Flexione. Modern language A modern language is any human language that is currently in use. The term is used in language education to distinguish between languages which are used for day-to-day communication (such