Analysis of the characteristics of female names in the Qin and Han dynasties
During the Qin and Han dynasties, the gender characteristics of female names were not significant, which is reflected in the fact that some characters appeared in both male and female names.
The three major characteristics of female names in the Qin and Han dynasties: class, epoch and gender are not obvious. Class nature is reflected in the difference in the common words of upper-class female names and lower-class female names, and it is easier for lower-class women to express patriarchal thinking in their personal names.
The contemporaneity is reflected in the names of women in the early Qin and Han dynasties, they still retain the naming methods of the pre-Qin period, and women in this period are not shy about their mother's names when naming.
Although there were some female names that could identify gender, most female names were indistinguishable from male names, and gender could not be judged by personal names.
Zhao Yi pointed out in the "Examination of the Emperor Yu Cong" that there are many women in history who have used male names, such as Emperor Gao's harem Zhao Zi'er, Empress Wei Zifu, Wei Junru, Wei Shao'er, female doctor Chun Yuyan, Wang Zhengjun and his sister Junli, Jun Di, Sima Junli, Princess Shaofu of Jiangdu, Chen Junfufu, Bao Xuan's wife Huan Shaojun, Sun Quan's two daughters Lu Ban and so on.
He believes that this phenomenon is caused by the frequent use of the characters "Jun", "Zi" and "Fu" in the names of men and women, among which the character "Jun" is particularly common, appearing in more than 60 female names.
In the Qin and Han dynasties, the word "shi" was not only in the male name, but also the appearance of the word "jun", such as Dou Changjun, the elder brother of Empress Dou of Emperor Wen of the Western Han Dynasty, Wei Qing's half-brother Wei Changjun, and Wang Mang's character is Jujun.
In the Qin and Han dynasties, examples of male names with "son" or "husband" abounded, such as Zhang Yu and Chen Sui during the period of Emperor Xuan of the Han Dynasty, and Li Xun during the period of Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty, their characters were all "eldest sons", while men with the word "husband" had Xifu bowing during the period of Emperor Ai of the Western Han Dynasty.
From the names of princesses in the Han Dynasty, we can see that there is not much difference between men and women in their names. According to the summary data of the names of princesses in the Han Dynasty, it can be seen that only the names of four cases, including Liu Xuan, the daughter of Emperor Wen of the Han Dynasty, Liu Boji, the sister of Emperor Guangwu, and Liu Ji and Liu Xiaoji, the daughters of Emperor Ming of the Han Dynasty, can identify the gender, accounting for only one-tenth of the total.
Other female names, such as "Liu Guang", "Liu Xiu", "Liu Cheng" and other princesses' names, are no different from ordinary men's names. This kind of personal names that are difficult to distinguish between genders are also reflected in male names, such as Han Wangxin's great-grandson name Han Yan, usually, Yan is a word to describe women, but Han Yan is a man.
Similar examples, there are also Shi Shu, the grandson of Shi Gao, the Marquis of Leling during the period of Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty, and Mrs. Ding during the period of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, all of whom were male and female names.
During the Qin and Han dynasties, there was a certain class in the naming of female names, and the naming habits of the lower classes were different from those of the aristocratic class. For example, the words "Ji" and "Jiang" often appear in the names of the lower classes, but rarely in the names of the aristocratic class; The word "Jun" is the word with the most female names, accounting for 7 of the total number of names1%, but the class distribution of its appearance is uneven.
Most of the female names with the word "Jun" come from Han Jian and inscriptions, a total of 45 cases, accounting for 69 of the total number of Jun characters2%。Most of these women are family members of tunnel soldiers, and a few are the family members of Wei Cheng's wife Xuanjun and San Laotong, but they still do not belong to the upper class.
There are 20 cases of women with the name of "Jun" recorded in the official history, including upper-class women such as the queen Wang Zhengjun, but there are also women of low status such as Xu Pingjun.
The characters "Ji" and "Jiang" seem to be more popular with middle- and upper-class women than "Jun", and in 23 of them there were Han Dynasty princesses or daughters of scholars' families.
The surname Ji of the Zhou Dynasty and the surname Jiang of the Qi Kingdom intermarried with each other, so Ji and Jiang became the good names of aristocratic women. Later, there was a trend of "changing surnames and names", which were used for women's names.
But until the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty, Ji Jiang still seemed to retain an aristocratic atmosphere, and was used by the aristocratic class to name women, and was not popularized to the lower classes. Secondly, the lower class people have a stronger sense of patriarchy.
During the Qin and Han dynasties, there was already a patriarchal mentality. For example, the "Historical Records of Filial Piety" records Chun Yugong's affairs: Qi Taicang ordered Chun Yu to be punished for public crimes, and the edict was imprisoned and relocated to Chang'an.
There are no men in Taicang, and there are five women. The Taicang Gong Guild arrested him and scolded his daughter: "Giving birth to a son is not a man, and it is not beneficial to have an emergency!" It can be seen that people at that time already had a sense of patriarchy.
This is also reflected in female names. According to statistics, during the Qin and Han dynasties, there were women named "donate", "donate", "brother" and "stop". These words all have the meaning of patriarchy.
Donate, "Notes on the Interpretation of the Text": "Donate, discard". "Stop" means to stop. "Shoulder Water Jinguan Han Jian" has a female name that is more representative, "The woman Xu Nu is eighteen years old." ”
The woman's surname is Xu Nuzhi, and her parents named her "Nuzhi", hoping to give birth to a daughter so far, which shows the hope for the boy.
During the Qin and Han dynasties, although there were no female names such as "Zhaodi" and "Pandi" to express their desire to have a boy, female names such as "brother", "Shang brother" and "brother qing" indicated the idea of preference for sons.
Most of these names came from ordinary people, and the upper nobles rarely took such names, only Wang Zhengjun's sister was named Wang Jundi. This reflects the differences in the propensity of people of different classes to choose names, which may be related to the education they received.
The upper class of the aristocracy had a privileged life and good living and educational conditions, so they could use more meaningful characters when choosing their names. The lower classes, on the other hand, lacked access to education, and their names usually expressed their ideas more directly.
During the more than 400 years of the Three Kingdoms from Qin to the end of the Han Dynasty, the way of choosing names gradually changed.
There are significant changes in the names of people in the Qin Dynasty and the early Western Han Dynasty, as well as in the Three Kingdoms period at the end of the Han Dynasty. It can be roughly divided into three stages: the late Qin and early Han dynasties, the middle Western Han Dynasty to the Eastern Han Dynasty, and the Eastern Han Dynasty to the Three Kingdoms.
First of all, there is the difference in the way the name is chosen. In the Qin Dynasty and the early years of the Western Han Dynasty, some characteristics of the pre-Qin period were retained, such as the name of the heavenly stem and the earthly branch. The sexagenary branch is a common naming method used by the Yin people, and the day of birth is used as the name of the baby when it is born.
Women in the late Qin and early Han dynasties still use this name, such as: "Giving birth to a child is called a woman." Ling Shi Huajian. Miasma. "The big maid is. It can be seen from this that most of the names with Ganzhi were before the middle of the Western Han Dynasty, and no such female names were found after that.
Secondly, the popularity of the word "Jun" is also of the times. Most of the female names with the word "Jun" are concentrated in the Western Han Dynasty, and the latest is Jun Ming, the granddaughter of the three elders in the early years of the Eastern Han Dynasty, and there are no female names with the word "Jun" after the Han Dynasty and the Eastern Han Dynasty.
It can be said that the names of people in the Qin and Han dynasties were also "fashionable", and the characters that were very popular at a certain stage were gradually replaced with the rise of new trendy characters.
First, let's take a look at how the meaning of a person's name is gradually enriched. In the early days, the meaning of female names was mostly simple, such as directly using the word female or next to the female character to indicate gender, or using the name of animals and plants.
However, there are also some names that are more difficult to understand, such as "containment", "leyao", "ou wu", "analogy" and so on in Qin Jian. After the middle and late Western Han Dynasty, female names with the meaning of morality, beauty, and wealth began to become popular, such as "Ji", "Jiang" and other names.
After the Western Han Dynasty, these names gradually became common names for upper-class women. In addition, the number of two-character female names has also begun to increase. Most of the names in the pre-Qin period were single-character names, because the naming style of the Spring and Autumn Period was relatively simple, and single-word personal names were able to meet the meaning expressed by people.
With the development of the times, the meaning expressed by the combination of two-character personal names has become richer, so it has gradually transitioned to double names. For example, Qin Jian and the Book of Songs have a total of 121 female names, of which 103 are single names, accounting for 851%, 18 cases with double names, accounting for 149%。
There are 16 cases with a single name and 14 cases with a double name, accounting for 53 cases each3% and 467%；In the Book of Han, there are 60 cases with single names and 57 cases with double names, accounting for 51 cases each3% and 487%。
Affected by Wang Mang's reform, the proportion of two-character female names in the Book of the Later Han Dynasty dropped to 317%, but then there were signs of recovering the double name, with 18 cases of single name in the "Romance of the Three Kingdoms", accounting for 563%, 14 cases with double names, accounting for 437%。
There were 21 double-named cases in Huayang National Chronicles, accounting for 34%.
During the Qin and Han dynasties, the development of female personal names went through a gradual transition from single-character personal names to two-character personal names. At the same time, not shying away from the mother's name has also become a characteristic of the times.
Although in ancient China there was a tradition of secluding the venerable, the relatives, and the sage, in the Qin and Han dynasties, there were even examples of mothers and daughters having the same name. For example, the names of the three elders' wives, daughters-in-law and granddaughters are recorded in the "Three Elders' Diary", although according to the traditional principle of avoidance, the younger generations should avoid the words in the names of the elders, but the granddaughter of the three elders is still called "Junming".
This shows that in the Qin and Han dynasties, naming did not always strictly follow the principle of avoidance.
Although"Jun"The use of characters was relatively common at that time, but there are still cases in the Huayang National Chronicles of the country where children did not avoid their mother's name. Such as:"gave birth to two sons, married to Zhang Duliao's daughter Huiying, and married less to Xun's family, all of whom were rich and noble, and served as maids.
Seventh, eighth, self-enrichment of materials. "
Among them, Zhang Liangze's wife's name is Chen Huiqian, his daughter's name is Zhang Huiying, and the names of his mother and daughter are included"Megumi"Word. This may indicate that the Qin and Han dynasties were less strict about mothers' names than fathers, and may also be a reflection of the lower status of women than men at that time.
Names can truly reflect people's ideals, values, moral norms and social customs, and are an important window for the study of history, culture, and social thought.
Through the study and understanding of women's names in the Qin and Han dynasties, we can better understand the changes in the status of women in the family and society at that time, and also help to investigate the ideological concepts and social life conditions of the common people in the Qin and Han dynasties.