On the many other names of the Chinese
Or: "you only get it if you're literate and well-educated people"
I wrote about Chinese names back in 2023 in On the many names of the Chinese: 姓、氏、名、字、号 and Exploring the origin of family names Xingshi 姓氏. Prompted by a recent discussion on Discord, here’s a sequel on appellations "称谓" (chēng wèi) used in Chinese works when they refer to a person. Appellations can be considered a type of "名号" (míng hào) although some of these are official or semi-formal titles (头衔, tóuxián ) as well. Under this broad heading of appellations, you have epithets, sobriquets and geographical and titles or official appellations.
These come up a lot in the original Chinese readings and even later works. They can be quite confusing or bewildering for beginners like me: you read a text and they mention someone and you go “who the heck is that”. Oftentimes, you would only know who the name refers to if you already know it or you already know enough about the person, history, or context to guess who it is. For beginners like me, it is useful to know they exist and to recognise them so that I can try to look them up and figure out who the person in question is.
Examples of these appellations include:
Posthumous title “谥号” (shì hào) and Temple Name 庙号 (miào hào) .
Studio name 斋名 (zhāi míng) .
Geographical appellations: Native place or “home town” 籍贯 (jí guàn), Prestigious lineage or clan 郡望 (jùn wàng) and Place of Office / Title 官地 (guān dì) - official location.
Titles or official appellations: 官名 (guān míng) - official title and 爵名 (jué míng) - title of nobility.
There is a lot of content and for today I will only talk about the shihao or posthumous title “谥号” (shì hào). I will try to give some popular or common examples using persons from previous posts where possible.
The Posthumous title or shihao 谥号
The shihao or posthumous title or epithet “谥号” (shì hào) is a type of hao1 that is given posthumously to a king, emperor, noble, general, senior government officials or famous literati.
Cao Cao (曹操）of the Three Kingdoms period was posthumously given the shihao Emperor Wu of Wei “魏武帝” (Wèi Wǔ Dì).
Zhuge Liang, also of the Three Kingdoms period, was posthumously given the shihao of the Loyal and Martial Marquis “忠武侯” (Zhōng Wǔ Hóu). The temple honouring him in Chengdu (成都) is thus called the Wuhou Shrine (武侯祠).
Given the official or semi-official nature of these titles, certain titles are reused or repeated across dynasties and eras and you will see them applied to different persons. You can identify or differentiate them through contextual clues such as the dynasty name or surname.
“Emperor Wu” 武帝” (Wǔ Dì) is a frequently used shihao for emperors across the dynasties and you have an “Emperor Wu” in almost every dynasty. The Wu here means “martial”2 and thus Emperor Wu "武帝" or “武宗”3 was typically awarded to emperors with significant military achievements or authoritarian reforms. You can usually differentiate the different Emperor Wu or Martial Emperors by the dynasty prefix (in Chinese) or suffix (in the English translation).
Emperor Wu of Han 汉武帝 (Hàn Wǔ Dì).
Emperor Wu of Northern Zhou 周武帝 (Zhōu Wǔ Dì)
Emperor Wuzong of Tang 唐武宗 (Táng Wǔ Zōng)
Emperor Wuzong of Ming 明武宗 (Míng Wǔ Zōng)
The Wu 武 appellation moved from a more positive nature to neutral and finally to a negative connotation over time. Thus, Emperor Wu of Han 汉武帝 is usually seen as highly positive for his expansion of China’s borders and use of force to establish peace. But by the time of the Ming, the appellation of Wu to Emperor Wuzong of Ming 明武宗 (Míng Wǔ Zōng) was meant negatively as though he was successful in war and quelling rebellion, he was seen as eccentric, reckless or even tyrannical: more “warlike” than “heroic”.
Similarly, the Loyal and Martial or “忠武” shihao is one that is reused later in Chinese history. It is considered one of the most prestigious titles to an official or general in Chinese history and is only given if the person satisfies the twin requirements of unwavering loyalty and military prowess. The recipient of this title is almost guaranteed ethnic national hero status in China. Two of the most famous recipients of the Loyal and Martial or “忠武” shihao are Guo Ziyi 郭子仪 (Guō Zǐyí) of Tang and Yue Fei 岳飞 (Yuè Fēi) of Southern Song.
An example of the shihao using in place of the name is in Du Fu’s 杜甫 poem 《洗兵马》 ("Washing Armor"), written to celebrate the Tang victory over the An Lushan Rebellion. The couplet “郭相忠武唐中兴，司徒清鉴悬明镜。” refers to the Loyal and Martial Chancellor Guo. This is not the best example though as the poem was written shortly after the victory while Guo Ziyi was alive and thus before the shihao was awarded…Ironically, Du Fu dies before Guo Ziyi…
Note the use of Chancellor Guo or “郭相” here which is an example of another appellation, the official title or 官名 (guān míng).
Next post, I will either touch on the Temple Name 庙号 (miào hào) or jump straight into another appellation.
Sources and references:
Sources: Various offline and online sources with《古代文化知识精讲》by 喻旭初 / 简紫鋆 as primary reference and online references mostly to check the appellations of the historical figures in the examples.
AI Use: Deepseek and Qwen were used for quick translations and to check the appellations of the historical figures in the examples.
See On the many names of the Chinese: 姓、氏、名、字、号 on what is a hao generally.
Not to be confused with the surname Wu such as 吴.
From the Tang onwards, the emperors started going wild with the shihao and they became ridiculously long culminating in some crazy long shihao by the time of the Qing Dynasty. As such, historians started using the Temple Name 庙号 (miào hào) which is used in ancestral worship in place. The miaohao is given posthumously like the shihao but has a different focus from the personal achievements of the emperor as in the shihao but more on the emperor’s dynastic role or the character of his reign. I will talk about this in another/next post.