Most surnames in Europe and America originated in the Middle Ages, and a few can be traced back to ancient Greece and the Roman Empire. China people's surnames originated from the worship of wind, clouds and thunder thousands of years ago. Feng, Shennong Houlei, Huangdi Houyun. Because many surnames in later generations are derived from the earliest ancestral surnames according to the differentiation of different regions and deeds, all surnames belong to the clan, so it can be said that the surnames of China people are descendants of the Chinese people after Hua Xushi.
Before the Qin Dynasty, surnames and surnames had different meanings. In ancient times, the word surname was composed of two characters: "person" and "fate", meaning that people were born and surnames were born. The original meaning of stone is woody, that is, the root of plants.
Before Shang and Zhou Dynasties, surnames were used to distinguish marriage, so there were same surnames, different surnames and common surnames. Surnames are used to distinguish between high and low. Noble people have surnames, but poor people have no surnames. People with the same surname cannot marry, but people with different surnames can get married.
In the Western Han Dynasty, the difference between surnames tended to disappear. Sima Qian's Historical Records formally used surnames together without distinction.
China's earliest surnames all had the word "female", such as Ji, Jiang, Gui and Gui. It can be inferred that surnames were formed in the matriarchal clan period. There are less than 30 surnames that can be determined by inscriptions on bronze in the Western Zhou Dynasty, and most of them come from the "female" side. In the era of "only knowing his mother, but not his father", there are many stories of "saints born without father". For example, Nu Wa felt the gorgeous rainbow light and gave birth to Zhuan Xu, while Hua Xu followed the footsteps of human beings and became pregnant with Fuxi. The ancestor of Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties was also his first mother who ate plantain seeds (Dayu), swallowed eggs (Qi) or practiced the divine fetus obtained by Xiong Ji (Hou Ji). When we learned about Xuanyuan's surname, Ji's surname, Lishan's surname and Jiang's surname of the Yellow Emperor, in fact, we were also told that surnames were a pedigree based on maternal blood earlier, and the formation of paternal society was marked by an increasingly grand pedigree marked by surnames.
Compared with the earlier matriarchal clan line, the "surname" expressed by geographical differentiation (from the place names and titles given to fiefs, such as Zhao and Zheng), occupational differentiation (from the perspective of being good at a certain skill, such as Tao, Zhang, Wu and Bu), official differentiation (from the perspective of official positions, such as Situ and Shi) or other secular achievements may be different at first. And these heroic descendants with expensive surnames may find a new name different from their ancestral surnames for a blood relationship, and then take surnames by surnames and replace surnames by surnames.
The change from the primitive lineage marked by matrilineal reproduction to the paternal lineage marked by heroic achievements and their places of occurrence (Yandi and Huangdi) is the first turning point in the historical cycle of surname differentiation, and surnames have become surnames after a long time. If the original surname always represents an older maternal or paternal blood relationship, then "teacher" is a historical event in which outstanding people in this blood relationship (surname) separate their blood ties with their own events or historical causes (taboos, giving surnames, etc.). ), so that their descendants can mark their blood lineage separately in this branch. The so-called "surname" is used to distinguish between noble and noble, but it refers to the fact that most people with the same blood in history have disappeared silently because they have no surname. Only the most outstanding people will get the "surname" because of secular achievements or memorable historical events related to them, so that they can mark their unique descendants in the blood of the same surname and become new surnames.
In fact, the combination of "surname" and "surname" in the pre-Qin period, which was distinguished through complicated efforts in Sima Qian's Historical Records, is a natural product of the historical cycle in which surnames are divided into surnames and surnames eventually become surnames. The evolution of China people's surnames from few generations to many generations is the result of the continuous accumulation of blood heroes who survived the destruction in the rolling torrent of blood.
It can be said that Taishi is a heroic epic. China people always read the distant and sacred evidence of an independent surname, and read some immortal beliefs and memorable achievements. No matter how far away Wan Li is, no matter when and where, the descendants of the Chinese people who are in different places will always return to the place with the same blood as this surname to recognize their ancestors and return to their ancestral homes.
Judging from the Yellow Emperor's Jitu Shi Ming, maternal reproduction is no longer the foundation of Shi Ming. The origin of surnames in later generations can be roughly divided into the following categories:
1. Name the surname according to the place name, location and country number of the place of residence. Such as Zhao, Simon, Zheng and Su.
2. Name the surname after the ancient surname. Such as Ren, Feng and Zi.
3. Name the surname with the name or character of the ancestor. Such as Huangfu, Gao, Diao, Gong and Shi.
4. Take brothers as surnames. Such as Bo, Zhong, Shu and Ji.
5. Address surnames by official names. Such as Shi, Cang, Si Tu, Zhao Shi, Tai Shi, etc.
6. Life with professional skills. Such as Zhang, Wu, Tu, You, Bu and Tao.
7. Take the ancestor posthumous title as the surname. For example, wearing clothes and talking on the phone.
8. Ancient ethnic minorities borrowed Chinese characters as surnames. For example, Tuoba changed to yuan, bare dew changed to Zhu, two customs changed to Guan, and oregano changed to buttons, and so on.
9. I changed my surname because I gave it and avoided it. For example, Hu gave the hero the surname Li and the dynasty gave the surname Zhu. Emperor China's name was that his usual taboo was changed to Chang. The ancestor of the Jin emperor was Sima, so the teacher's surname was changed to Shi Shuai.
10. Change the surname in order to avoid vendetta. For example, the descendants of Duanmu Zigong changed their surname to Mu, and the surname of Niu changed to prison.
There are many forms of surname origin, and there are not a few cases where the same surname is different or the same. With the passage of time, the popular situation of taking the single surname of both parents to synthesize compound surnames may also become a new way of naming surnames.
The number of surnames varies greatly between ancient and modern times. A more general statistic is that the total number of surnames in ancient and modern times is about 1 10,000, many of which are not used today. The number of surnames still used in China is far above 1000.
The earliest book about surnames was Shiben, which was written in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. Shiben is also the first book on surnames in the world. Since then, a large number of writings on the origin of surnames have appeared.
The genealogy of Deng clan in the Eastern Han Dynasty is the first genealogy of single surname in China. By the time of Zhenguan and Kaiyuan in the Tang Dynasty, the genealogy of surnames gradually became a prominent school, and an unprecedented upsurge of folk genealogy was formed in the Northern Song Dynasty. Hundreds of Family Names is an enlightening book compiled by a scholar in Hangzhou in the early Northern Song Dynasty, which has a wide influence so far. After the hundred surnames were added, there were 4 14 surnames and 60 compound surnames. Since the Northern Song Dynasty, private genealogy has become a wonderful work in the history of China's ancient and modern writings. During the period of the Republic of China, almost every surname and ethnic group had a musical score, and everyone regarded it as a lifelong event.