According to statistics, in 2018, in the number of newborn names in China, three-character names occupied the mainstream, accounting for 92.9%; followed by two-word names, accounting for 4.6%... Due to the life characteristics of Chinese (More than 95% of Chinese-style names, single surnames occupy the absolute majority of Han surnames), it can be judged that in addition to the surnames, the current Chinese are generally two-character names, that is to say, "one-word surname + two-word name" is the main mode of the new Chinese name.
In fact, a closer look can be found that now people around, especially young people, the number of "two-word names" is far more than the "single-word name", which can actually be understood, of course, not that the "single-word name" is not good, but usually the vast majority of parents, hope to give their children's names contain relatively more information, plus in order to avoid duplicate names as much as possible, so now parents prefer to take "double-word names", because this is relatively good to name a little.
But if you think about history carefully, it seems that you can find a law, as if in ancient China, "single word name" was the mainstream.
Don't believe it, let me give you an example, in the Three Kingdoms, you look for celebrities with two-character names, it's really not easy to find, Liu Bei, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Cao Cao, Dianwei, Sun Quan, Zhou Yu, Zhuge Liang... They are all "one-word names"; the two-character names seem to be hermits, such as Huang Chengyan.
Most people during the Three Kingdoms period were monogram names
But what about the Tang Dynasty? It seems that there are some different names, there are one-character names, Li Zhi, Qin Qiong, Wei Chigong; there are also two-character names, Li Longji, Wei Chigong, Cheng Zhijie; the Ming Dynasty is also the same, single-character names and two-character names are quite a lot, the emperor is mostly two-character names (except Zhu Di), what about the ministers? There are two-character names, Liu Bowen, Li Shanchang, Hu Weiyong; there are also single-character names, Xu Da, Lan Yu, Tang He...
So, how did Chinese's life go from "single" to "double"?
In general, from ancient times to the Western Han Dynasty, the name of a word and the name of two characters were similar, the name of one word was mainly used from the end of the Western Han Dynasty to the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and the name of the two characters was mostly used in the Southern and Northern Dynasties until modern times, and there were also cases of using three-character names in modern times.
The name of the emperor of the Han Dynasty, just one is two-character, and later changed
In fact, at the beginning, the names of the Han people were mainly "single" characters, and a small number of emperors in the Han Dynasty were double-character names, and later they were even deliberately changed to single-character names, the initial name of the Han Zhao Emperor was "Fu Ling", the initial name of the Han Xuan Emperor was "Sick", and the initial name of the Han Ping Emperor was "Jizi", but later they were changed to the single names "Fu", "Inquiry" and "衎". Obviously, at that time, "one-word names" were not only mainstream, but in some ways more "appropriate".
Why? First of all, we must know ah, everyone can hear the names of people now, that are all figures with heads and faces, many small people, have not read much, that name, for example, let's talk about Zhu Yuanzhang's old Zhu family, he was called Zhu Zhongba before changing his name, father Zhu Wusi, grandfather Zhu Chuyi, some people rumor that this is the Yuan Dynasty Mongols harsh government of the Han people, in fact, it is wrong, the small people have no culture, they are used to such a name. Many of the Names of the Song Dynasty documents that have been handed down are also like this.
Emperors of the Ming Dynasty, except For Zhu Di, are both double-character names
The emperors of the Han Dynasty not only liked single-character names, but also sometimes liked to use strange characters, in fact, there was a reason for the convenience of the common people to avoid it. This is a very unique custom in ancient China, which means that when talking and writing, when encountering the name of the monarch, it should be avoided, and it can be replaced by other words, or the word is deliberately missing. Of course, avoidance is usually limited to the real name of the monarch and the honorable lord. Font size avoidance is less common
The emperor should pay attention to the name, can not be taken randomly, because your name uses the word, the people can not use, so in order to reduce this phenomenon, the emperor uses a single word name, and many find some strange words, such as Han and Emperor Liu Zhao, Han Emperor Liu Miao.
Avoidance is also a troublesome thing, which is the avoidance method of the name of the Qing emperor
"Hearing the name of the ancient Son of Heaven is difficult to know and easy to hide." Nearly the people have written to the offender, and they have great pity. It's more inquisitive. All the violations are ordering the former, forgiving them."
- Book of Han. Emperor Xuan's Chronicle
At the same time, for the people below, the possibility of the two-word name being taboo is naturally greater, and the readers in the system will certainly not touch this moldy head.
What is even more strange is that when Wang Mang was in chaos, there was such a strange order to "make China not allow two names", What Wang Mang wanted to do, that is, retro reform, he believed that "Qin used to restore the name of the widow, so it was forbidden to restore the name", although Wang Mang's chaotic government did not last long, but the society is a popular single-word name, Wang Mang has undoubtedly intensified the phenomenon of "single-word name" popularity.
Blind tossing Wang Mang
But there is obviously a problem with single-character names, that is, it is easy to duplicate names, the Jin Dynasty is finished with wuhu chaohua plus the chaotic world of the north and south, many etiquette is not so exquisite, two-character names are more and more, to the late Eastern Jin Dynasty, the upper class popular a special compound name: single name plus a virtual word, such as adding a "zhi" after the single name, adding a "Dao" in front of the single name, adding a "monk". There is also the revision of the family tree, at that time many people in the name of the habit of fixing one word as a generation, the other word free to play, and later caused the habit is that the two-word name has become more.
Of course, this brought a lot of trouble to the work of "avoiding secrecy", in the Song Dynasty, when the secrecy was greatly developed, the number of an emperor's avoidance words increased sharply, "Rong Zhai Sanbi · Eleven" Cloud
"The study of shangwen in this dynasty is great, so the ceremonial officials discuss, and every time they want more, the temple has five crosses." Examination papers are held on the spot, small involvements are suspected, and scholars do not dare to use them, or commit crimes, often secretly deposed. ”
The Song Dynasty said that it was relatively relaxed, but it was extremely strict in avoiding secrecy
See, it's not easy to read people, a bunch of words can't be used, if you use it wrong...
In the Ming and Qing dynasties, Cheng Zhu Lixue's status became higher and higher, and repairing the family tree became an important task, so there were more and more double-character names, because it was convenient for family management, coupled with the development of China's feudal society to the peak, the population exploded, and there were as many as 400 million people in the middle of the Qing Dynasty, and then the phenomenon of taking a single name with the same name and the same surname was too obvious, so the double name began to become more; although after the Xinhai Revolution and the founding of the country, the traditional patriarchal system withered away, and the inexplicable thing of avoiding secrets did not exist, but the trend of more double-character names remained unchanged.
At this time, it would be too troublesome to engage in such strict avoidance, so it is also "changed by custom", the name of the two characters of the Ming Dynasty does not shy away from using one of these words, and the sound is close and there is a suspicion of a name, and there is no need to avoid it; so-called
"The second name is not biased, the partial name is not secret" (but some people will still avoid partiality in order to show humility),
Therefore, the prince can share the character with the emperor.
Even, there is now a trendy way of naming the father's surname after the mother's surname (in ancient times, unless it was a very special situation, it was impossible to add the mother's surname), so there were even many four-character sexual names.