Why is 洛 associated with Kyoto / the capital? I recently found out that the kanji is associated with Kyoto / the capital. Here are some example words showing this association: : "in Kyoto or the capital" : "outside Kyoto or the capital" : "southern part of Kyoto​ / south of the capital" I figured it must be from the time when Kyoto was Japan's capital, but I've been unable to find where the relation between and "capital" comes from. Could it be similar to how, for example, is associated to America, and with Asia? Maybe was used to write "capital" or "Kyoto" at some point?

It was because we Japanese borrowed many words from Chinese.

For example is the capital of English) in Three Kingdom Age.

Here Wiki says,

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> Kyoto was in old times called or , appropriating the words of Chinese Empire's ( capitals ). A theory holds Kyoto was once divided into to 2 sides, East and West, respectively the West was called the East, , was called Whereas, has lots of swampy lands, so that eventually the street style remained only in ( the East ), Therefore the word came to denote the center of Japan, and just using of became to denote the capital.

The famous another example is that was later called which is the after name equivalent with Chinese one after he resigned the old Japanese political ranking .