In ancient China, people's names often reflected the society's etiquette system and historical background. In the epic literary work "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", many heroes and heroes have two-character names, such as Xiang Yu, the overlord of Western Chu, Liu Bang, the ancestor of Han Gao, and their generals Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Han Xin, etc. However, there are also some people with three-character names, such as Zhuge Liang, Sima Yi, Xiahou Wei, etc., but the reason why they have three-character names is because their surnames are compound surnames, and their names are actually single characters.
Why were most people's names two characters in the Three Kingdoms era? This question involves the influence of ancient liturgical systems and historical traditions. Ancient society attached great importance to etiquette, and the ancient book "Li Ji Qu Li" stipulated an ancient name title etiquette, that is, the name of the honorable chief could not be called two characters at the same time, and the two characters must be called separately.
This rule can be traced back to the mother of Confucius, the founder of the Confucian school, whose name was Fu Yan and her name was signified. Therefore, her descendants can only call her "in" or "sign", and cannot use both words at the same time. Over time, this rule of name appellation gradually evolved, leading to the perception that taking a three-character name was unruly, considered inferior, and had a lower status than a person with only a single-character name. Therefore, starting from the Qin Dynasty, taking single-character names became a system.
However, there is another theory as to why most Three Kingdoms era people have two-character names. In the New Dynasty, a dynasty that existed for a very short period of time, the ruler Wang Mang proposed a reform, called the "ban on two-character names", which banned the use of two-character names. This reform had a profound impact on society, even spreading to the surrounding barbarian countries. People no longer dare to use two-character names, only single-word names.
There is also a story to the introduction of this decree. Wang Mang had a grandson named Wang Zong, who was the eldest son of Wang Mang's eldest son, Wang Yu, the future crown prince. However, with ambitions, Wang Zong secretly plotted to usurp power and made his own emperor's dragon robe, and asked a painter to paint a portrait of him wearing a dragon robe. He even conspired with his uncle to try to seize the throne. However, this plan was discovered by Wang Mang's close ministers, and Wang Mang was very angry when he learned of it. Although Wang Zong was Wang Mang's own grandson and the legitimate successor to the throne, Wang Mang decided to order Wang Zong's name to be changed back to his original name Wang Huizong to show that he had committed the crime of treason.
Although this system gradually disappeared after the fall of Wang Mang, most people still followed this tradition during the Three Kingdoms period, and their names remained single-worded. However, there were some exceptions, such as Cao Cao's nephew Cao Anmin, Wei Guo Langya Taishou Shan Zichun, Liu Bei's wife Sun Shangxiang, etc. This shows that such decrees gradually lost their influence during the Three Kingdoms period. From the perspective of modern people, no matter how many words the name has, it will not be regarded as a symbol of high and low. Society has changed dramatically, and is no longer as attached to the number of words in a name as it was in ancient times.
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