List Of Common Chinese Surnames
These are lists of the most common Chinese surnames in the Republic and People's Republic of China, as well as among the Chinese diaspora overseas, as provided by authoritative government or academic sources. Chinese names also form the basis for many common Vietnamese, Korean, and Japanese surnames in both translation and transliteration into those languages.
The conception of China as consisting of "the old 100 families" (老百姓, Lǎobǎixìng) is an ancient and traditional one, the most famous tally being the Song-era Hundred Family Surnames. Even today, the number of surnames in China is a little over 4,000, while the year 2000 US census found the number of American surnames held by at least 100 people to be more than 150,000 and more than 6.2 million surnames altogether.
The Chinese expression "Some Zhang, some Li" (张三李四, Zhāng sān, Lǐ sì) is used to mean "anyone" or "everyone", but the most common surnames are currently Wang in mainland China and Chen or Chan in Taiwan. A commonly cited factoid from the 1990 edition of the Guinness Book of World Records estimated that Zhang was the most common surname in the world, but no comprehensive information from China was available at the time and more recent editions have not repeated the claim. However, Zhang Wei (张伟) is the most common full name in mainland China.
Read more about List Of Common Chinese Surnames: Greater China Region
Famous quotes containing the words list of, list, common and/or chinese:
“Shea—they call him Scholar Jack—
Went down the list of the dead.
Officers, seamen, gunners, marines,
The crews of the gig and yawl,
The bearded man and the lad in his teens,
Carpenters, coal-passers—all.”
—Joseph I. C. Clarke (1846–1925)
“Do your children view themselves as successes or failures? Are they being encouraged to be inquisitive or passive? Are they afraid to challenge authority and to question assumptions? Do they feel comfortable adapting to change? Are they easily discouraged if they cannot arrive at a solution to a problem? The answers to those questions will give you a better appraisal of their education than any list of courses, grades, or test scores.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)
“Academic and aristocratic people live in such an uncommon atmosphere that common sense can rarely reach them.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)
“Elsa Bannister: The Chinese say “It is difficult for love to last long; therefore one who loves passionately is cured of love, in the end.”
Michael O’Hara: That’s a hard way of thinking.
Elsa: There’s more to the proverb: “Human nature is eternal; therefore one who follows his nature keeps his original nature, in the end.””
—Orson Welles (1915–1985)