It often happens that the literal place name itself remains unchanged but the actual scope it refers to has changed greatly in Chinese history. Here we call it connotation change of place names. The concept of Chuanjiang has undergone significant changes since its appearance during the Tang and Song Dynasties in history. In the early Song Dynasty, Chuanjiang referred to the entire Yangtze River or its upper, middle, and lower reaches, which was quite surprising. During the Ming and Qing Dynasties, it mainly referred to the entire upper reaches of the Yangtze River. But in modern times, the actual scope of Chuanjiang has undergone a gradually narrowing down process from the entire upper reaches of the Yangtze River to from Leshan to Yichang, from Yibin to Yichang, and from Chongqing to Yichang. Before the Song and Yuan Dynasties, the special political, economic and cultural status of Bashu area made Bashu shipping have a high status, which became the support of Chuanjiang discourse for the middle and lower reaches. However, due to the special complicated river course, the special flat-bottomed wooden boat passing performance and the navigation of beach teachers in special areas in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, wooden boat transportation in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River once occupied the passing advantage in the whole Yangtze River shipping in the traditional era, and once dominated the operation of the whole Yangtze River shipping to some extent. Since modern times, the narrowing of the connotation of Chuanjiang has something to do with the fact that hot spots have gathered in the discourse of motor boat transportation in the situation where motor boats have entered Chuanjiang and the status of wooden boats has declined relatively. Through research, we have found that the historical connotation change of place names in China can be further divided into two situations: scaling connotation change of place names and allopatry connotation change of place names. The former is more typical while the latter is more complex. The connotation change of place names can be divided into two processes in terms of time: diffuse connotation change of place names and rapid connotation change of place names. Generally speaking, the connotation change of geographical names in administrative divisions is relatively fast in history, while the process of connotation change of geographical names in cultural regions is relatively long, and the influencing factors are also relatively diverse. However, due to the adjustment of relevant national administrative regions, the process of connotation change of geographical names in cultural regions will also be accelerated.