Mandarin Names for Gamers

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Introduction Transcription Pronunciation (Vowels) Pronunciation (Consonants) Names for People Surnames Personal Names Ship names Legal stuff

Note that there are Chinese characters on this page in utf-8 encoding. Please set your browser to utf-8 encoding to see them; otherwise, you will see meaningless squiggles. (Of course, if you can't read Chinese, then maybe it's not an important difference.)

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Notes -- Please read!

I really do mean Mandarin names. I don't actually know much about other forms of Chinese, and for this reason I should give…

An introduction to Chinese and Chinese names

Chinese is not a language. It is rather a language family, perhaps something like the idea of 'Germanic' or 'Latinate'. The languages of Chinese include Mandarin, Wu, Min, Kejia, Yue, Huizhou, Xiang and Gan (to give their Mandarin names). Kejia is also known as Hakka, Min is also called Hokkien, and Yue is commonly known as Cantonese.

These languages are related in that they use basically the same system of writing (characters) and that they derive basically from a similar linguistic source. However, their pronunciations and grammars are mutually exclusive, and usually mutually incomprehensible. The situation is much like that of German and English, where a native English speaker can read German words most of the time, but will have a hard time putting them together to understand a full sentence, and will probably not know very well how to pronounce the words (unless she or he has studied German, of course). For more on this, see the Wikipedia article on the Chinese languages, in particular the question of whether Chinese is a language or a language family.

I know only Mandarin with any degree of usefulness, and what I will present here is only Mandarin. The pronunciations of the names I will give here in Cantonese, Hokkien, etc. are mysteries to me.

However, names do generally maintain the same structure in the different Chinese languages, and therefore, while the pronunciations may be different, the ways of using the names and frequency of use will be basically the same. Not always, but often. This is much like German has the name "Gerhard" where English has the name "Gerard" or whatever.

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A note on transcription

Transcription of Mandarin into Latin letters is and always has been a very tricky issue. Mandarin and the other Chinese languages do not have a native (phonetic) alphabet as such; even historically, trying to establish the pronunciation of Chinese words in (for example) native-language dictionaries has been a difficult task. To make matters worse, Chinese languages often have sounds that do not have easy equivalents in European languages. Also, Chinese languages are all tone-based, and transcribing these is difficult at best. Historically, the process of transliterating Mandarin (writing Mandarin in another language's script) has always proven to be a headache for those who operate at the interface.

Nonetheless, there are systems to transliterate Chinese. The system I use to transliterate Mandarin is called Pinyin (full name, Hanyu Pinyin). This is the official transliteration system of the People's Republic of China (PRC, mainland China). Pinyin is also used in Malaysia, Singapore and many, many Mandarin classes the world over. The ROC on Taiwan has no really thorough-going transliteration system. Many things in the ROC are done in a slipshod manner, and transliteration is one of the worst offenses. Most of the world uses Pinyin, and I predict that it will become the standard throughout the world in the future.

Some examples of Pinyin (as opposed to other systems) are Beijing, Daoism and Mao Zedong. I will not note tones here, as there isn't a very natural way to do it, but I will be glad to provide tones on request. Please do not try saying these names to Chinese people without a disclaimer first! Words in any Chinese language are often identical save for differences in tone. Thus, we get the famous Mandarin sentence 'mama ma ma ma man' (to give it without tone diacritics), or "Mom curses the hemp horse for being slow". There are hordes of other examples, such as two different ways to say 'zonghui' which could either mean "a social club" or "grey-brown". Remember: Mandarin without tones is really pretty meaningless.

A side note: the transliterations (if that's what they are) used in many games, for example 2300 AD, are also quite slipshod. I suppose it's quite natural to expect some editorial blunders, but I find the tendency of Westerners to lump all problems with Chinese into a basket labeled 'I don't need to understand this' reprehensible, and I think the lack of care with which Westerners treat Chinese transliteration is an unfortunate part of the vicious circle which causes Chinese relations with most Western countries to be as hostile as they are.

Please show your respect for Chinese cultures by respecting their languages, and by respecting these names.

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A note on pronunciation

Pinyin is generally pronounced pretty similar to English, though there are several significant differences. The following are some basics, inspired partially by my Lonely Planet guide to Taiwan.

Vowels

• a as the 'a' in "father" – note this – It's not like in "bang"! "Chang" does not rhyme with "bang," but rather with "bong."
• ai as the 'i' in "I" or "die"
• ao as the 'ow' in "cow"
• e as the 'ur' in "blur" (British pronuniciation) or the 'u' in "but"
• ei as the 'ay' in "way" or the 'ei' in "weigh"
• i as the 'ee' in "meet," BUT after c, ch, r, s, sh, z or zh it sounds like the 'er' in "her" (British pronunciation) or the 'o' in "woman" (American pronunciation)
• ian sounds like "yen"
• ie as the 'ye' in "yet"
• iu as the 'io' in "O solo mio"
• o as the 'o' in "or"
• ou as the 'oa' in "boat" or 'oe' in "Joe"
• u as the 'u' in "flute" (American pronunciation) or 'oo' in "woo" (British) BUT after q, j, x and y, as a German umlauted u
• ü as the German umlauted u
• ue is difficult, as it doesn't have a very good equivalent in English. It's basically an umlauted u followed by an "e" sound, as in "wet." Pronouncing this is one of the hardest things for students of Mandarin.
• ui as "way"
• uo as "war" (British pronunciation)

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Then there's the consonants… These are generally similar to English, save for a few exceptions:

Consonants

• c as the 'ts' in "bits" or the Russian "tsar"
• ch as in English, but with the tongue curled back
• j as the 'j' in "Joe" – a hard J, NOT as Dan Rather pronounces it!
• h a gutteral, as in the Scottish "loch"
• q basically like ch, but with the tongue further forward than in English
• r as the 's' in "pleasure"
• sh as in English, but with the tongue curled back
• x basically like sh, but with the tongue further forward than in English
• z as the 'ds' in "suds"
• zh as the 'j' in "judge" but with the tongue curled back

Therefore, a fonetik spelin of "Qingdao" (a major city in Shandong, famous for its German-like beers) might be 'Ching dow'. Beijing could be spelled 'Bay jeeng'. I won't go on with these spellings, though; they hurt my eyes.

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So, then, on to...

The Names

Names For People

Mandarin personal names do in fact differ a bit between, for example, Taiwan and Beijing. Beijing names tend to have single-character personal names, and different last names are common in Taiwan than in Beijing. However, I'm going to lump them all together as I think the trends are mostly transitory, especially if Taiwan ever gets linked to the Mainland again.

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Surnames

Mandarin (and Chinese) surnames always go first. Or at least they should. Westerners have gotten it confused for a long time, and now, Mandarin-speakers have started putting their surnames last. It makes the situation very confusing. It's like one of those "Three's Company" episodes where everybody was saying, "Does he know that I don't know he knows, or does he know that I know he knows that I don't know?" I knew a guy in grad school whose name was Wang Li. Or is it Li Wang? I'll probably never know, because I never saw the characters written and I never got a straight answer out of him (he was a very shy guy).

Chinese surnames, like English ones, have meaning, but few people pay attention to them or even truly understand what the meaning has to do with the actual name. I have noted, where appropriate, interesting things about each name. I have also tried to list a number which allows for easy dice-rolling; some of the names are not as common as others, but were included to round out the list.

Very Common:

Less common:

There are many more (the famous "Hundred Surnames," synonymous in Chinese with "the hoi-polloi but these should be sufficient.

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Personal Names

Chinese personal names are rather different from their English equivalents. In English, every name has a meaning, but its meaning is likely rather obscure, and is also likely to be a single noun (as my name, Rachel, means 'lamb' in Herbrew). In Mandarin (and other forms of Chinese) however, the meanings of names are readily apparent, and are also frequently verb phrases or at least adjective-noun phrases. Thus, a typical Chinese name might be "Pride of the Country," "Respects the Ancestors" or "Elegant Lotus" in translation.

Note that Chinese names often sound ridiculous when translated into English. Trust me, our names sound stupid when translated into Chinese as well. Mandarin personal names are usually very rigidly either masculine or feminine. However, as some names can be androgynous, I will list all the names together with their meanings, which should suggest their general genders. I will give only actual combinations here, as there is a danger that someone playing around with a group of possibilities could come up with something that would sound horrendous to Chinese ears and would therefore not occur in reality. Do however note that the number of combinations possible is pretty much limitless, though in practice only certain names are common.

As with the surnames, above, I have made notes here as appropriate, and have also tried to include a number which allows for easy random generation if needed. Not perfectly, though, but if you don't know how to randomly choose a name from a list without resorting to dice, you need to work on some basic skills...

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Names for Ships

SF gamers love starships, and I'm no exception. And those starships need realistic names, right?

Chinese ship names tend to be pretty boring. They often resemble personal names quite strongly, as a matter of fact, though they also sometimes use place names or slogans. As with personal names, the immediacy of the meanings of Chinese names when translated into English means that they sometimes sound a little silly. Okay, not just a little. Remember, though, that English names also mean something, we're just not directly conscious of the meanings most of the time (except with British ship names), and Chinese people think names like "Cook," "Baker" and "Smith" are pretty goofy, too.

Oh, and before I get into it -- the standard suffix for ship names is hao, similar to the English S.S. (though of course S.S. is a prefix). Hao means something like "number" or "mark," and is used for both civilian and military vessels. Thus, the USS Enterprise is called the Qiye Hao in Mandarin.

Naming conventions: Ships of a single class often have similar names. For example, all the PRC frigates of one class may bear the names of mountains; ROC ships tend to share a single character, usually the last, with the others of their class; the Star Line ferries in Hong Kong all have names with the word xingstar") in them. This is similar to English schemes, especially Royal Navy schemes in which all ships of a single class have names beginning with, for example, L. Therefore, I will suggest names for whole classes, rather than single vessels. When choosing the name scheme for a class, you should probably consider what sort of function the class will serve and choose appropriately; a naming scheme based on mountains would be good for military vessels, while a naming scheme based on harmony might be good for commercial vessels.

Note that these names would be easily applied to weapon systems, as well.

Also note that I have given simple titles to each class. However, in real Chinese, the ships in a class will usually be named after the first ship in the class, so don't take the class name suggestions too seriously. When a class' naming scheme is such that all ships in the class share a single character, the class will typically be called the "X-character class," with the word "character" being zi. Thus, the Da (Grand) class is called, in Chinese, the "Da-character (Dazi) class." I have included the zi in class names where appropriate.

Names for Organizations

Organizations, such as companies or schools, tend to have names which strongly resemble personal names. In some cases, they actually are personal names -- the names of their founders, for example. However, they do tend to have strong tendencies towards specific types of names. For example, companies often have names reminiscent of profit, money or gold, while schools tend to have names which talk about study, learning or morality. These tendecies are far from absolute, though. Many schools are simply named after their locations, for example. Below are some ideas for organizations, based on type. I got many of them from the Taibei phone book, so even if they sound really silly, there's a good chance they're real. I especially like the ones about the universe.

General company names

# Mandarin Translation # Mandarin Translation 1 Anshun Peaceful smoothness 26 2 Anshan Peaceful mountain 27 3 Baicheng Hundred accomplishments 28 4 29 5 30 6 31 7 Baolai Treasure comes 32 8 33 9 Baosheng Precious victory 34 10 35 11 Dacheng Grand accomplishments 36 12 37 13 38 14 Hongguo Grand nation 39 Xinghai Sea of stars 15 40 16 Hongxin Vast profits 41 17 42 18 43 19 44 Yongcheng Ever-successful 20 Lihong Profitable rainbow 45 Youde Friendly virtue 21 Lianxin Allied trust 46 Yucheng Universal city 22 47 Yuxin Profits of the universe 23 48 Yuzhou Axis of the universe (this is a real name!) 24 49 Zhicheng Intent on success 25 Mingtai Bright grandeur 50 Zhide Perfectly moral

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Schools Well, that's about it. Of course, there are many more names that can be used, and of course there are always alternate pronunciations of the above (for different kinds of Chinese, for example). This page will probably always be under construction. Sorry, but I unfortunately don't get paid to update this page.

Legal notes & disclaimers

Due to various problems I've had with the way people use this page, a couple notes are in order here.

First, these notes are put up in the interest of spreading knowledge of Chinese names, but that does not mean that this page is free for you to use in any way you see fit. You may use the names presented on this page for your personal and non-profit use, but you may not republish these pages in any way without my express permission.

Second, I have gotten a lot of people writing to me asking to explain the meaning of their adopted daughter's name or whatever else. Sorry, but I cannot tell you what a Chinese name means unless you can provide me with the characters. Determining meaning from transcription alone, even with tone diacritics, is extremely difficult. I can guess, but if you take names seriously, as I do, you should go about determining their meaning in a serious way. If you do have the characters, send a picture of them to me in .gif format and I will tell you what they mean when I can get around to it. If you want suggestions for names and/or characters, I suggest you go to the people who arranged your adoption first. I can suggest names, but I cannot then be held responsible for any unfortunate puns, incorrect usages or whatever other errors occur due to my lack of knowledge of Chinese. Take this as notice. Requests for the meaning of Chinese names without useful transcription or characters will not be answered.

Third, I've recently been getting a spate of people asking me to translate their names into Chinese so they can get tattoos. Sorry, but I won't help you in this matter. Tattoos can be cool, but I think that very few people who want to get their names tattooed in Chinese really care about Chinese culture. It's just another fad, and one that promotes cultural misunderstandings at that. Here are a couple articles that show how stupid and dangerous getting Chinese tats can be. It is possible to have intelligent, interesting Chinese characters tattooed, but it's very, very likely that whatever you're getting written on your body is dumb. Why take the chance?

I guess that's what happens when you get famous -- you have to start making disclaimers. Feh.

Please give me any feedback you may have at rachelk6@hotmail.com, or through my personal account (the address of which I prefer not to put up on the Web so as to avoid spam).

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This page (http:// www.jiawen.net/ chinesenames.html) and all contents designed and ©2000-2004 by Rachel Kronick. No republication in any form permitted without express permission from Rachel Kronick. All rights reserved. Last updated May 21, 2004.