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From: deb5@midway.uchicago.edu (Daniel von Brighoff)
Subject: Re: Chinese (was Languages & Happiness)
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References: <5ebo1p$g7a@reader.seed.net.tw> <5ev4l0$49p@gap.cco.caltech.edu> <7fafos183z.fsf@phoenix.cs.hku.hk> <5f4mhd$s5h@gap.cco.caltech.edu>
Date: Fri, 28 Feb 1997 15:36:34 GMT
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In article <5f4mhd$s5h@gap.cco.caltech.edu>,
Wei-Hwa Huang <whuang@ugcs.caltech.edu> wrote:
>sdlee@cs.hku.hk (Lee Sau Dan ~{@nJX6X~}) writes:
>>    Wei-Hwa> (Incidentally, can someone tell me where the names for
>>    Wei-Hwa> Chinese dynasties came from.  I could never figure that
>>    Wei-Hwa> out.)
>>Do you mean their Chinese names, or their Romanizations?
>
>Chinese names.  E.g., Qing1, Min2, Yuan2, Tang2, etc.  They're not
>related to the surname of the imperial line, as far as I can tell,
>so where do these names come from?

At some point, dynastic founders begin choosing felicitous names for their
dynasties based on the five phases (wuxing).  Thus, the "fiery" Ming
("bright" = sun + moon) dynasty yields to the "watery" Qing ("clean" =
water + green/blue).  In fact, the Qing was originally called the "Houjin"
or "later gold" dynasty (the first Jin dynasty was founded by the
ancestors of the Manchus during the...um...12th century?), but this was
changed by Nurhaci's grandson under advice from Chinese scholars.

I'm not sure how far this goes back.  The application of five phases
theory to dynastic succession goes back at least to the Later Han.  There
must be more to the choice of names than just that, but I'm not learned
enough in Chinese philosophy to know what.




-- 
	 Daniel "Da" von Brighoff    /\          Dilettanten
	(deb5@midway.uchicago.edu)  /__\         erhebt Euch
				   /____\      gegen die Kunst!
