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| May 2002 |
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| DID YOU KNOW? |
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The Origin of Chinese Surnames
The Chinese have had surnames long before the period of the Three Emperors and
Five Kings, that is, during the time when recognition was given only to one's
mother and not one's father. Hence, the Chinese character for surname is made up
of two individual characters----one meaning woman and one meaning to give birth.
That is to say, the surnames of the early Chinese followed the maternal line.
Before the three dynasties of Xia, Shang and Zhou (2140-256 BC), the people in
China were already having surnames (Xing) and clan-names (Shi). The surnames
originated from the name of the village in which one live or the family to which
one belonged, while the clan-name derived from the name of the territory or the
title granted, sometimes posthumously, by the emperor to a noble for an
achievement. Hence, only nobles had surnames as well as clan-names.
A man and a woman of the same clan-name could marry each other but they could
not if they were of the same surname.
This is because the Chinese had discovered, long ago, that marriages of close
relatives would be detrimental to future generations.
In any solemn ceremony or important celebration, the Chinese have their
clan-names written on lanterns which are hung high in a prominent place, such as
the main entrance of the house.
As a clan-name indicates the ancestral home, it is also carved on a man's
tombstone to indicate a hope that he will return there.
This went on for 800 years until the rule of Emperor Tang Tai Zong (627 AD). Gao
Shi Lian, a government official, made a survey and found that there were a total
of 593 different surnames.
He then wrote and published a book called "Annal of Surnames" which became a
reference for selecting qualified personnel as government officials and for
arranging marriages.
The book, "Surnames of a Hundred Families", which was popular in China during
the old days, was written more than 1,000 years ago during the Northern Song
Dynasty (960 AD).
It records 438 surnames of which 408 are single-word surnames and 30 were
double-word surnames.
According to the latest statistics from China, Chinese with the surname Zhang
alone number more than 100 million, making it probably the surname which the
most number of the Chinese have.
Another set of statistics compiled in 1977 reveals that the number of the
Chinese with the first 10 major surnames make up 40% of the Chinese population.
The 10 major Chinese surnames are:
Zhang, Wang, Li, Zhao, Chen, Yang, Wu, Liu, Huang and Zhou.
Below are the next 10 major surnames. The Chinese with these surnames make up
over 10% of the Chinese population: Xu, Zhu, Lin, Sun, Ma, Gao, Hu, Zheng, Guo
and Xiao.
The number of the Chinese in the third category of 10 major surnames make up
just about 10% of the population:
Xie, He, Xu, Song, Shen, Luo, Han, Deng, Liang and Ye.
The following 15 surnames form the fouth largest group of the Chinese surnames
are:
Fang, Cui, Cheng, Pan, Cao, Feng, Wang, Cai, Yuan, Lu, Tang, Qian, Du, Peng and
Lu.
A total of 70% of the Chinese population have one of the surnames above. The
surnames of the remaining 30% are comparatively rare. Some of these surnames
are:
Mao, Jiang, Bai, Wen, Guan, Liao, Miao and Chi
.Source: ChinaVista
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