A Chinese style name, sometimes also known as a courtesy name, is an extra name that could be used in place of the given name. It could be given by one's parents or adopted later in life by oneself. The tradition of adopting style names faded out since the May Fourth Movement and is rarely practised today. There are two common forms of style name, the zi and the hao. This article is in need of attention from an expert on the subject. ...

Zi

Zi, sometimes called Biao Zi or courtesy name, is a name traditionally given to Chinese males at the age of 20, marking their coming of age, or sometimes to females when they are married. This practice is not very common in modern Chinese society. According to the Book of Rites (礼记), after a man becomes an adult, it is disrespectful for others of the same generation to address him by his given name. Therefore, the given name is reserved for oneself and one's elders, while zi would be used by adults of the same generation to refer to one another in formal occasions or writings; hence the term "courtesy name". Traditional Chinese characters are one of two standard character sets of printed contemporary Chinese written language. ... Simplified Chinese characters (Simplified Chinese: 简体字; Traditional Chinese: 簡體字; pinyin: jiǎntǐzì; also called 简化字/簡化字, jiǎnhuàzì) are one of two standard character sets of printed contemporary Chinese written language. ... Pinyin (拼音, Pīnyīn) literally means join (together) sounds (a less literal translation being phoneticize, spell or transcription) in Chinese and usually refers to Hànyǔ Pīnyīn (汉语拼音, literal meaning: Han language pinyin), which is a system of romanization (phonetic notation and transliteration to roman script) for Standard Mandarin used in the... Wade-Giles, sometimes abbreviated Wade, is a Romanization (phonetic notation and transliteration) system for the Chinese language based on Mandarin. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Kanji ( â–¶(?), literally Han characters) is the name of Chinese characters in the Japanese language. ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Romaji ローマ字 For other meanings of Kana, see Kana (disambiguation). ... Japanese writing Kanji 漢字 Kana 仮名 Hiragana 平仮名 Katakana 片仮名 Uses Furigana 振り仮名 Okurigana 送り仮名 Rōmaji ローマ字 Category Rōmaji (ローマ字 Roman characters, sometimes misunderstood as romanji in English), is a Japanese... Hangul (hangul: 한글; revised: hangeul; McCune-Reischauer: hangÅ­l) is the native alphabet used to write the Korean language, as opposed to the Hanja system borrowed from China. ... Hanja (hangul: 한자; hanja: 漢字; revised: hanja; McCune-Reischauer: hancha; lit. ... The Revised Romanization of Korean is the official Korean language romanization system in South Korea. ... McCune-Reischauer is one of the two most widely used Korean language romanization systems, along with the Revised Romanization of Korean, which replaced (a modified) McCune-Reischauer as the official romanization system in South Korea in 2000. ... The Classic of Rites (禮記 Lǐ Jì, or Liki) was one of the Five Classics of Confucianism; it described social forms, ancient rites, and court ceremonies. ...

Zi is mostly disyllabic (consisting of two characters) and is usually based on the meaning of the ming or given name. Yan Zhitui (颜之推) of Northern Qi Dynasty believed that the given name is used to differentiate one from another, while zi expresses one's moral integrity. Chinese given names (Chinese: 名字; pinyin: míngzì) are made up of one or two characters. ... The Northern Qi Dynasty was one of the Northern dynasties of Chinese history. ...

The relation between zi and the given name is evident in the case of Mao Zedong (毛泽东), whose zi was Runzhi (润之). "Ze" (泽) and "run" (润) share the same radical - 氵, which signifies water. At the same time, both characters could also mean "to benefit" or "to nourish". â–¶(?) (December 26, 1893 – September 9, 1976; Mao Tse-tung in Wade-Giles) was the chairman of the Politburo of the Communist Party of China from 1943 and the chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China from 1945 until his death. ... The left part of mā, a Chinese character meaning mother, is a radical that means woman A radical (from Latin radix, meaning root) is a basic identifiable component of every Chinese character. ...

Another possible way to form a zi is to place "zi" (Simplified Chinese: 子; Traditional Chinese: 子; Pinyin: zǐ) - a respectful title for a male - as the first character of the disyllabic zi. For example, Gongsun Qiao's zi was (子产), and Du Fu's zi was Zimei (子美). Simplified Chinese characters (Simplified Chinese: 简体字; Traditional Chinese: 簡體字; pinyin: jiǎntǐzì; also called 简化字/簡化字, jiǎnhuàzì) are one of two standard character sets of printed contemporary Chinese written language. ... Traditional Chinese characters are one of two standard character sets of printed contemporary Chinese written language. ... Pinyin (Chinese: 拼音, pÄ«nyÄ«n) literally means join (together) sounds (a less literal translation being phoneticize, spell or transcription) in Chinese and usually refers to HànyÇ” PÄ«nyÄ«n (汉语拼音, literal meaning: Han language pinyin), which is a system of romanization (phonemic notation and transcription to Roman script) for Standard... There are no contemporaneous portraits of Du Fu; this is a later artists impression Du Fu or Tu Fu (杜甫; pinyin: Dù FÇ”; Wade-Giles: Tu⁴ Fu³), also known as Dù Shàolíng (杜少陵) or Dù Gōngbù (杜工部) (712–770) was a prominent Chinese poet during the Tang Dynasty. ...

It is also possible to place in front of zi a character which expresses one's rank in one's family. For instance, Confucius, whose Chinese name was Kong Qiu, was the second son of his family. Therefore, his zi was Zhongni (仲尼), where "zhong" means ranking second among brothers. This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ...

The use of zi began sometime in Shang Dynasty and became most popular during Zhou Dynasty, and slowly developed into a system. During Zhou Dynasty, women were also given zi. However, the zi for a female was mostly formed by putting together a character signifying her rank in the family and her surname. Shang Dynasty (Chinese: 商朝) or Yin Dynasty (殷代) (1600 BC - 1046 BC) is the first historic Chinese dynasty and ruled in the northeastern region of China proper. ... The Zhou Dynasty (周朝; Wade-Giles: Chou Dynasty (also Chow or Jou)) (late 10th century BC or 9th century BC to 256 BC) followed the Shang (Yin) Dynasty and preceded the Qin Dynasty in China. ...

Prior to the 20th century, sinicized Koreans, Vietnamese and Japanese also used zi. (19th century - 20th century - 21st century - more centuries) Decades: 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s As a means of recording the passage of time, the 20th century was that century which lasted from 1901–2000 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar (1900–1999 in the... Sinicization, or less commonly Sinification, is to make things Chinese. ...

Zi of some famous people:

• Confucius
  • Family name: Kong
  • Given name: Qiu
  • Zi: Zhongni
• Zhuge Liang
  • Family name: Zhuge
  • Given name: Liang
  • Zi: Kongming
• Li Po
  • Family name: Li
  • Given name: Bai
  • Zi: Taibai
• Sun Yat-sen
  • Family name: Sun
  • Given name: Wen
  • Zi: Zaizhi
• Mao Zedong
  • Family name: Mao
  • Given name: Zedong
  • Zi: Renzhi

This article needs to be cleaned up to conform to a higher standard of quality. ... An artist impression of Zhuge Liang holding his trademark feather fan. ... Li Po (701-762) was a Chinese poet, considered the greatest romantic poet of the Tang dynasty. ... Sun Yat-sen (November 12, 1866 – March 12, 1925) was a Chinese revolutionary leader who had a significant role in the overthrow of the Qing Dynasty. ... ▶(?) (December 26, 1893 – September 9, 1976; Mao Tse-tung in Wade-Giles) was the chairman of the Politburo of the Communist Party of China from 1943 and the chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China from 1945 until his death. ...

Hao

Hao (Simplified Chinese: 号; Traditional Chinese: 號; Pinyin: hào; Korean: ho) was an alternative courtesy name to zi and is usually referred to as the pseudonym. It was most commonly three or four characters long, and perhaps first became popular due to people having the same names. Hao was usually self-selected and it was possible to have more than one. It had no connection with one's given name or zi, but was often a very personal, sometimes whimsical choice perhaps embodying an allusion or containing a rare character, as might befit an educated literatus. Another possibility was the use of one's residence name as his Hao; therefore Su Shi's Hao of Dongpo Jushi (Resident of Dongpo, a house he built while in exile). Hao was also often used in the title of a writer's collected works. Simplified Chinese characters (Simplified Chinese: 简体字; Traditional Chinese: 簡體字; pinyin: jiǎntǐzì; also called 简化字/簡化字, jiǎnhuàzì) are one of two standard character sets of printed contemporary Chinese written language. ... Traditional Chinese characters are one of two standard character sets of printed contemporary Chinese written language. ... Pinyin (Chinese: 拼音, pÄ«nyÄ«n) literally means join (together) sounds (a less literal translation being phoneticize, spell or transcription) in Chinese and usually refers to HànyÇ” PÄ«nyÄ«n (汉语拼音, literal meaning: Han language pinyin), which is a system of romanization (phonemic notation and transcription to Roman script) for Standard... Su Shi (蘇軾) (1037-1101) was a writer, poet, artist, calligrapher and statesman of the Song Dynasty, one of the major poets of the Song era. ...

External links

• Introduction to Chinese Names

See also

• Chinese name