Chinese surnames are full of surprises. Chen Lifu, an employee of Suining Municipal Archives, spent more than 30 years and finally wrote a 2.2 million-word "Chinese Surname Calligraphy Dictionary", which collected 10,129 surnames.
In the late 1960s, Chen Lipu collected the correct pronunciation and origin of surnames.
After changing his career, he was assigned to work in the Suining Municipal Archives. He used his spare time to dive into the sea of ??books in Wenshan. During his vacation, he traveled across most of China and collected many strange surnames. And use the fonts of famous calligraphers from ancient and modern times to write the surnames contained therein.
Chen Lipu's "Chinese Surname Calligraphy Dictionary" records 10,129 surnames, including more than 8,000 Han surnames and more than 2,000 ethnic minority surnames.
For example, the surname with the word "Guang" on the outside and the word "Mi" on the inside is an indigenous Sichuan surname in Anju Town, Suining City and Anyue County, Neijiang City. Can't even find it in the dictionary.
The surnames he collected are all strange, even "1" and "," are surnames.
"1" is an indigenous surname in Henan, a variant of stick.
"," is also an indigenous surname in Henan, and is a variant of "lord".
Among the surnames collected in this dictionary, even "one, two, three...nine, ten", "one, two, three...jiu, Shi" are all surnames.
All surnames have their origins indicated. For example, the local "Yi" surname in Fuling was originally a descendant of Sima Yi from the Three Kingdoms era, and "Yi" is a variant of Yi.
Another compound surname "Chen Mi" is a descendant of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom general Shi Dakai.
The origin and influence of "Hundred Family Surnames" "Zhao Qian, Sun Li, Zhou Wu, King Zheng, Feng Chen, Chu Wei, Jiang Chen, Han Yang;..." Most Chinese people are familiar with such four-character rhymes. .
Even illiterate people who "cannot read a single big character" have at least heard of "Hundred Family Surnames"! Everyone's surname is an important part of a personal symbol, a special symbol of the family, and is closely related to social life and historical traditions.
The well-known "Hundred Family Names" is an enlightenment book that has been widely circulated among Chinese people since the early Northern Song Dynasty (10th century AD) and has a profound influence. It has a history of a thousand years. .
But who wrote the famous "Hundred Family Surnames"? When was the book written? Where was the first edition? It remains a mystery to this day.
According to the research results of many scholars since the Ming and Qing Dynasties, "Hundred Family Surnames" probably had its original version before the Song Dynasty. Edited and processed by an unknown Confucian scholar.
The first person to mention "Hundred Family Surnames" in written records was the great patriotic poet Lu You (1125~1210 AD) of the Southern Song Dynasty.
He once wrote three poems "Residence in the Suburbs in Autumn". The third poem said: Children study in winter and make noise among neighbors. Don't look at people face to face.
The author's own note at the bottom of the poem is: Farmers send their children to school in October, which is called winter school.
The "Miscellaneous Characters" and "Hundred Family Surnames" that are read are called village books.
It can be seen that as early as the Song Dynasty, "Hundred Family Surnames" had been very popular.
The sentence "Zhao Qian Sun Li" at the beginning of "Hundred Family Surnames" is because the emperor of the Song Dynasty was named Zhao, and during the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period, the king of Wuyue Kingdom was named Qian.
Some scholars in the Song Dynasty believe that "Sun" is the surname of the princess, and "Li" is the surname of the emperor Li of the Southern Tang Dynasty.
So there is such an order.
The earliest engraved and printed version of "Hundred Family Surnames" currently available was published in the Yuan Dynasty (early 14th century AD), and was composed of Chinese and Mongolian phonetic notation.
However, the version published in the Yuan Dynasty was not complete.
The popular "Hundred Family Surnames" was not finalized until the Ming Dynasty.
The popular version of "Hundred Family Surnames" contains 438 surnames, including 408 single-character surnames, compiled into 102 sentences; 30 double-character surnames, compiled into 15 sentences; and finally, There are 118 sentences and 472 words in the sentence "One Hundred Family Surnames End".
Around the late Qing Dynasty, another "Zengguang Hundred Family Surnames" appeared, which included 444 single-character surnames and 60 double-character surnames. Conclusion.
The various versions of "Hundred Family Surnames" inscribed in the Qing Dynasty that can be seen so far are full of text and pictures.
There is a picture at the top of each page, drawing some historical celebrities, marking the name, and indicating the county (his famous family - the birthplace or place of birth of the prestigious family); at the bottom, the surnames are compiled into The four-character rhyme is catchy when read, and the sound is pleasant to the ear, like an ups and downs four-character ancient poem, which makes people enjoy listening to it and is easy to read and remember.
There have been many adaptations of "Hundred Family Surnames" in the past dynasties, such as "New Notes on Hundred Family Surnames" compiled by Huang Zhouxing in the late Ming Dynasty, and "Imperial System of Hundred Family Surnames" compiled in the name of Emperor Kangxi in the Qing Dynasty. ", "Three Parts of Hundred Family Surnames" adapted by Ding Yan during the Xianfeng period (1851~1861 AD), etc.
These "new editions of "Hundred Family Surnames"" have taken a lot of effort in arrangement, and all have their own unique features, but in the end they have not been able to replace the old ones, which shows how vital they are. powerful.
"One Hundred Family Surnames" has not only been passed down from generation to generation among the Han people, but also has phonetic translations of "One Hundred Family Surnames" among brother ethnic groups, such as "One Hundred Family Surnames in Mongolian Alphabet" and "One Hundred Family Surnames in Jurchen Alphabet" "wait.
The great influence is evident from this.
According to preliminary statistics, there are 6,403 surnames that have appeared in Chinese historical records, including: 3,730 single-character surnames and 2,498 three-character surnames. Character surnames: 163 four-character surnames: 9 five-character surnames: 3 However, more than half of them, especially many polyphonic surnames, have long disappeared from history.
According to statistics from the 1980s, there are 2,225 Chinese surnames in use in Beijing; 1,640 in Shanghai; 1,270 in Shenyang; 1,574 in Wuhan; 1,245 in Chongqing; and 1,245 in Chengdu. There are 1,631 in Guangzhou and 1,802 in Guangzhou.
There are 2,587 different surnames in the above seven major cities***.
According to reports, among the nearly 2,000 people in Taiwan Province, there are 1,694 surnames.
It is estimated from these data that among the 1.1 billion people using Chinese surnames in China's 31 provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions, the number of existing surnames is about 3,000.
Statistics from the 1982 China Census show that among Chinese surnames, Li, Wang, and Zhang are the most common, accounting for 7.9, 7.4, and 7.1 of the total population respectively. The 100 surnames are: Li, Wang, Zhang, Liu, Chen, Yang, Zhao, Huang, Zhou, Wu, Xu, Sun, Hu, Zhu, Gao, Lin, He, Guo, Ma, Luo, Liang, Song, Zheng , Xie, Han, Tang, Feng, Yu, Dong, Xiao, Cheng, Cao, Yuan, Deng, Xu, Fu, Shen, Zeng, Peng, Lu, Su, Lu, Jiang, Cai, Jia, Ding, Wei, Xue , Ye, Yan, Yu, Pan, Du, Dai, Xia, Zhong, Wang, Tian, ??Ren, Jiang, Fan, Fang, Shi, Yao, Tan, Liao, Zou, Xiong, Jin, Lu, Hao, Kong, Bai , Cui, Kang, Mao, Qiu, Qin, Jiang, Shi, Gu, Hou, Shao, Meng, Long, Wan, Duan, Lei, Qian, Tang, Yin, Li, Yi, Chang, Wu, Qiao, He, Lai , Gong, Wen.
These 100 surnames collectively account for 87% of the population, while the top 19 surnames account for half of the population.
However, looking at each province and city individually, the distribution of surnames is different.
For example, in the Beijing household registration card, the number of people with the surname Wang actually accounts for 10.6, the surnames Li and Zhang each account for 9.6, and the surname Liu accounts for 7.7. The above four surnames account for one third of the total population of Beijing. More than one; plus 12 surnames such as "Zhao, Yang, Chen, Xu, Sun, Ma, Wu, and Gao", *** account for about half of the total population of Beijing.
In Taiwan Province, the top 10 surnames are: Chen, Lin, Huang, Zhang, Li, Wang, Wu, Liu, Tsai, and Yang. They account for more than half of Taiwan's total population.
Interesting last name facts: How do you pronounce your last name? Some special surname words have two pronunciations, indicating two different surnames.
When encountering such a situation, you can only ask the person: "How do you pronounce your surname?" There is a principle here: "The surname follows the owner", that is, it should be pronounced according to the pronunciation passed down from generation to generation in the family; Don't be self-righteous and misunderstand.
(In other countries, the pronunciation of surnames in other languages ??has similar situations.
) These special surnames are: Le, Qin, Tan, Gai, Zhao, and Xi. , Wei, Ben.
The respective explanations are as follows: the surname Yue is divided into two branches - Duyue (musical music), this branch is mainly distributed in North China; Dule (happy music), this branch is mainly distributed in the south.
The surname Qin is divided into two parts - pronounced Tan (yintan); ; ? Read Chan (yin cicada), mainly distributed in Sichuan; the surname Gai is divided into two parts - ? read Gai (yin concept); Shao); ? pronounced Zhao (yin Zhao), is the surname of the Dai people in Yunnan Province; the surname Xi is divided into two branches - ? Kui (yin Kui); pronounced Wei (yin Wei); the surname Ben is divided into two parts - pronounced Ben (yin Ben); pronounced Fei (yin Fei).
Accurately spelling out the pronunciation of surnames in Mandarin is of particular importance to the mechanization and automation of international banks and name retrieval.
Starting from June 15, 1979, the United Nations Secretariat officially adopted the Chinese Pinyin scheme to replace the old "Wittoma-style" spelling in the past as a way to transliterate Chinese in various Roman alphabet languages. Uniform standards for names.
The surname Xiao ranks 30th among Chinese surnames today and 30th among Taiwanese surnames.
Tongzhi Clan Summary: The Xiao family, the ancient Xiao Kingdom, was later annexed by the Song Dynasty. Daxin, the grandson of the Weizi of the Song Dynasty, was the head of the Pingnan Palace and had meritorious service. He was granted the title of Xiao, and his descendants regarded him as the clan.
According to the surname Xiao, it comes from the surname Ji and is a descendant of the ancient emperor Ku.
One of Ku's descendants was named Zhong Yan, who was the younger brother of Wei Zi, a famous official in the late Shang Dynasty.
Daxin, a descendant of Zhongyan, was a disciple of the Duke of Song Dynasty at that time.
Song general Nangong Wan rebelled, killed the king of Song, and made Gongzi You the king of Song. Daxin people supported Gongzi Yushuo as Song Huangong, and killed Nangong Wan and Gongzi You, making great achievements. , was granted the title of Xiao by Duke Huan, established the Xiao Kingdom, and was known as Uncle Xiao in history.
Later, the Xiao State was destroyed by the Chu State, and the descendants used the name of the country as their surname, and the surname was Xiao from then on.
During the Warring States Period, the Xiao surname mainly developed in Henan and Jiangsu.
During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, the Xiao surname was very prominent in the world and established the two countries of Southern Qi and Xiao Liang. It was also very prominent in Northern Qi, Northern Wei and Northern Zhou.
In the Tang Dynasty, some people with the Xiao surname began to move to Fujian. During the Song Dynasty, some people moved to Guangdong. During the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, people with the Xiao surname began to enter Taiwan.
In addition, the Khitan people with the surname Xiao who live in northern and northeastern China are also a very large family. They played an important role during the Liao Kingdom, which was in conflict with the Song Dynasty.
The main settlement areas of Xiao surname are: Lanling, Donghai, Guangling, Henan, Peixian, Duling, Wujin, Meizhou, Haifeng, etc.