A Chinese compound surname is a Chinese surname using more than one character. Many of these surnames derive from noble and official titles, professions, place names and other areas, to serve for a purpose. Some are originally non-Han, while others were created by joining two one-character family names. Only a few of these names (e.g. Ouyang, Shangguan, Sima, Situ) survive in modern times. Many clans eventually took on a single-character surname for various reasons. A small minority of Koreans and Vietnamese also have compound surnames.
Read more about Chinese Compound Surname: Compound Surnames
Famous quotes containing the word compound:
“He tries by a peculiar speech to speak
The peculiar potency of the general,
To compound the imagination’s Latin with
The lingua franca et jocundissima.”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)