Shum

Shum is a romanization of the Chinese letter 岑 in a Chinese person's name 岑献光, the non-phonetic nuance of the Cantonese language. Shum are the descendants of King Wu of the Zhou Dynasty, named so after an area during the Zhou dynasty (1122-221BC). Although not the descendent of Wu's first wife Yi Jiang (who gave birth to Song, later named King Cheng of Zhou), Shum is the descendent of Wu's second wife. As Song was later crowned King Cheng of Chou, and King Wu was the Duke of Zhou before being merged in the crown in 1046 BC, the Shum family was thus second in the line of succession, and accordingly, Duke and Duchess of the Zhou Dynasty.

Although, like other groups, they make up the Han Chinese people of today, the Zhou were the first semi-nomadic war-like barbarians to invade China, a mix of pre-ethnic groups that are considered today as Han, Mongol, Manchu, Tibetan and Turks. Although they originated from northwest and northeast Inner Mongolia and North China Proper (Gansu, Shaanxi and Shanxi provinces), they first migrated south to Henan. In due time they migrated to Sichuan, Zhejiang, and Shandong. Later they arrived in Guangxi and Guangdong. As time continued, so did the clan's travel and settlement in Yunnan, Guizhou, and Fujian provinces. The Cen clan family and surname has also spread to Jiangxi, Hong Kong, Macao, Hainan, Taiwan, Canada and the United States of America.

Due to the nature of Romanization, alternative translations could be to Cen, Sam, Sum, Ts'en, Gim and Cem. The surname is a combination of two characters, mountain and today.