Yellow River or Huang He (Traditional Chinese: 黃河; Simplified Chinese: 黄河; Hanyu Pinyin: Huáng Hélisten ; Wade-Giles: Hwang-ho, sometimes simply called the River in ancient Chinese, Mongolian: Hatan Gol) is the second longest river in China (after the Yangtze River) and the seventh longest in the world, at 4,845 km (3,395 mi) long. Originating in the Bayankala Mountains in Qinghai Province in western China, it flows through nine provinces of China and empties into the Bohai Sea. The Yellow River basin has an east-west distance of 1900 km, and north-south distance of 1100 km. Total basin area is 752,443 km².
The Yellow River is called the "Mother River of China" and "the Cradle of Chinese Civilization" in China, as its basin is the birth-place of the northern Chinese civilizations and the most prosperous region in early Chinese history. But frequent devastating flooding, largely due to the elevated river bed in its lower course, has also earned it the unenviable distinction as "China's Sorrow".