In Chinese, there are two characters meaning “river”, jiang (江)and he (河). There are a little interesting difference between these two characters. In south China, most rivers are named jiang, such as Xiangjiang(湘江, means xiang river), Hanjiang(汉江, means han river), etc., and rivers in north China are mostly called he, such as Weihe(渭河, means wei river), Jinghe(泾河, means jing river), etc.. Why are there two appellations referring to the same thing, river, between southern and northern China? Someone thought the scale was the reason. For example, jiang is bigger than he. Maybe that is ture, but I don't think it is the radical reason. I believe the basical reason with this phenomenon is connection with history.