This paper studies the uses of the word chino, china in northern Peru in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, via historical documents and popular poetry couplets. Contrary to previous proposals, we corroborate the actual use of this term, especially in its feminine form, and we propose two possible meanings for it: the first, linked to caste terminology, refers to a type of "racial mix" between "Indian" and "African", with a minor and variable component of "white blood", while the second refers to a young woman, usually a peasant. We also examine the use of the word as a formulaic way to appeal to the loved one in popular poetry and we conclude that, although probably this formula was derived from the racial terminology, the word quickly gained positive affective nuances, making it possible to refer to the woman that it was possible to court. It is suggested that the former meaning 'servant', central in colonial sources of sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, began to blur in the studied period and in line with previous works, We propose a competition between the word and its homophone, referred to Asian migrants since the late nineteenth.