The origin of Chinese surnames is very early, because it was initiated in the matrilineal clan period, so many ancient surnames, like the eight surnames of the ancients, have many female characters next to this reason. In the later development process, these eight ancient surnames have derived many surnames, of course, some are due to fiefdoms or official positions. There are only three strokes for a surname, but many people will mispronounce it, and people with this surname were forced to change their names for a while.
In fact, in the era of ancient Chinese legends further away, there was a Wushi era, and the original meaning of the clan here was god, which was a bit similar to the later emperor. The five surnames are the Youchao clan, which is said to be the inventor of the original human nest people, who taught people not to live on the ground, but to live in a house.
The second is the Fu Ren Clan, a group of people who drilled wood for fire in the church and began to end the history of human beings drinking blood. The third is Fu Xi, the ancestor of Chinese humanities, and legend has it that Bagua was invented by him. The fourth is the Nüwa clan, who is responsible for creating people, betrothaling and procreation. The last one is shennong, who tastes hundreds of herbs and teaches humans to raise livestock.
The surname was later, and this surname with only three strokes is the surname xiǎn, also pronounced shǎn. This is a relatively rare surname, which is the surname of the Longxi Qiang people during the Han Dynasty. It is said that the surname Yan is still derived from the surname of Jiang, and yan is a descendant of the surname of Jiang. There is also a name called Xiǎnzǐ, which is the origin of the surname. Most people may not be able to pronounce this word accurately, but he is actually almost the same pronunciation as Xian.
Longxi Commandery was established relatively early, in the thirty-fifth year of King Qin Zhao's reign (272 BC). In the Qin and Han dynasties, the Yan surname was a clan tribe of the Northwest Qiang people, and the successive names were a little different, but basically similar. At the beginning, this was because the clan tribe was too weak and could only follow the Huns. Later, Qin Shi Huang sent a large army to drive out the Xiongnu and build the Great Wall. In the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, the Xiongnu had nowhere to escape, and slowly the clan of this surname began to integrate into the Han people.
At the end of the Tang Dynasty, because of the war, they once migrated, and after crossing the Yangtze River, they were stationed in the southern edge of Huguang. In the eighth year of Tianshun (1464 AD) of Emperor Mingying's Zhu Qizhen, there was a man named Yan Mao during the imperial examination. It was embarrassing that only one person named Li Xian in the Manchu Dynasty knew the word, and seeing that it was pronounced the same as the pronunciation of Shaanxi, the emperor ordered him to change his surname. Lest too many people not know him. During the Ming and Qing dynasties, some of the Yan people went to gaozhuang village in Heze City to live, and the surname was too remote for everyone to recognize.
Many children are often asked when they are young, and after modern society, this word is still a strange word. It is also more troublesome when going to the account, because this surname is not available on the computer at all. So the 200 people in their village wanted to change their surname collectively, and since 2003, the children born have changed their surnames so that they will not have to wait for him to grow up. In 2006, some people changed their surnames again, and most of them chose to pronounce similar to their surnames when they changed. For example, some people will change to Xian and some people will change to Xian, so the police station suggested that you all change to Xian surname. By now, there should be very, very few people with the surname Yan, and if you take a little longer, you may never have this surname.
References: "Wan Liye Won compilation of different surnames", "Hanshu Feng Fengshi biography", "surname Kaoli"