China Talk Tuesday: Last Names

(This post is written in response to a request from a friend - what's up with Chinese last names??!)


Let's take our lasts name, for an example. The character is made up of three individual characters, all "housed" inside of a sort of "pavilion" radical. The characters are seven, fields and containers.



Random, right? 


I asked Lo Gung why our last name meant seven fields and containers, all inside a tent? Was he descended from a man who had seven fields, and jugs of honey in his house? 


His answer? Maybe. 


Here's how he explained Chinese last names to me: Once upon a time, families were simply known by either where their house was located (Underhill), or maybe what their occupation was (Smith). (Aside: Guys, you realize Underhill and Smith aren't Chinese, right? I'm simply using common English names to illustrate that this practice was common in Europe as well. Moving on.)


If a member of the family were to perform a particularly heroic, patriotic or otherwise Monumentally Helpful Act, the family would be called in front of the emperor, and given A Family Name. Wong, Chan, Lo, Ho, Lee...all common names. 


We speculated that it is possible that Lo Gung's forefathers may have owned 7 fields, or their great deed might have had something to do with containers and fields...which then led these emblems to be woven into the new family name, rather like a Family Coat of Arms. 


That being said, Chinese last names don't have an inherent meaning. Take, for example, the name Wong. Wong could mean yellow, or king...but the last name of "Wong" doesn't mean either of those things. It's just a last name. 


This, of course, isn't true for all names. When I was a missionary, my last name was "顏" (Ngan). It means, literally "color." (Which I always thought was humorous, as my first companion's name was "白"...which means "white." We were laundry piles! Moving on.) 


The difference between the last name of Wong and Ngan is that the character for Wong simply means The Last Name of Wong, while the character for Ngan is the character for "color." 


Any questions, class?