Д.В. Виноградов 5 курс, Институт переводоведения и многоязычия науч. рук. доц. Е.В. Виноградова The Origin of the Chinese Name What is implied in a Chinese name? Like in all communities it is a thing a human can’t do without, the feature that personifi es an individual belonging- ness to a family. From the historical perspective of Chinese name’s develop- ment, it’s obvious that name is an important part of the country’s culture. An- cient surname originated in the pre-historic time of fi rst Chinese tribes. Those days Chinese name comprised three types: one-stemmed (Zhang, Wang, Li, Zhao, etc.), two-stemmed (Huangfu, Sima, Ouyang, etc.) and multi-stemmed surnames (Aixinjueluo), etc. First Chinese surnames are said to appear in Henan province. Accord- ing to a legend, 6500 years ago the patron of all human beings Fu Xi came to Henan Huaiyang to bring prosperity to the people of that place. He started to give names to people that further turned into the surnames and initiated a marriage system. Also, Fu Xi taught people how to net fi sh, to hunt for fowl and cook it as well as how to make weapons. A hieroglyphic symbol of Fu Xi’s surname means “Wind” and therefore “wind” became the fi rst Chinese surname while Huaiyang was known as the “Emperor Xi’s Ancient Capital.” That was the fi rst China’s man to have created the tradition of taking up a surname. In fact, the origin of a surname is closely related to the idea of totem. In some cases a totem name could replace a clan name because ‘totem’ was interpreted as an abstract concept which could be referred to a clan, tribe, family or just a group of people whose occupation was hunting wild animals or gathering eatable plants. At fi rst, the members of a group discussed what could become a totem of the clan and after that they chose something (a thing, a phenomenon of nature or an animal etc.) as their distinctive marker empha- sizing the unique features of the community. For example, if they wanted tiger to become a totem of the clan it was named a ‘tiger clan’. In addition, the origin of a Chinese surname is closely related to women of that time and their social status. In the fi rst Chinese commentary mono- graph text named Origin of Chinese Characters written by Xu Shen (58-147 years AC) there were some explanations on the subject of the naming process and women’s role in it: “A man is given the name with his birth. It’s a miracle of a mother that feels the grace of the Heaven”. This quotation implies that a mother’s child in ancient China was blessed with divinity of heavens as 31 women were believed to be infl uenced by the celestial nature. In the matriar- chal society of ancient China, a child was born and brought up by his mother and left by his father in case of searching a new woman to continue his kin. Therefore, a hieroglyph “surname” consists of two components “female” and “life” as it shows that it is a mother who gives not only a birth to her child, but also a name and surname. According to the archaeological studies of the bronze inscriptions dedicated to the period of Western Zhou dynasty, most of the surnames of that time were given by women, such as: Jiang (姜), Ying (嬴) and so on. Huangdi, the fi rst emperor of the Celestial Empire was a man who also made a contribution to the development of the tradition of naming. He was known as tough but fair leader of Chinese population which numbered more than 70 surnames that originated directly or indirectly from the type of one’s occupation. The emperor was known to have 25 sons: 14 of them had a com- mon surname while the rest of his sons had a ‘Ji’ surname (people of Zhou dynasty bearing a 后稷 ‘Houji’ surname inherited another one – 姬 ‘Ji’ sur- name). There is a marvelous legend explaining why Houji surname evolved to Ji: “One day mother of Houji, Jiang Yuan, decided to have a walk around the fi elds; there she saw an offi cial (臣人 - chénrén) and fell in love with him at fi rst sight. Sometime later she gave a birth to a boy and gave him a name – Houji. When he grew up, he became an outstanding agricultural offi cial who was popularly called 神农 (‘Shennong’ – God of Agriculture). Emperor gave Houji an honorable surname ‘Ji’ and set him equal with the most respectable people of China”. Again, from the perspective of linguistics, the fi rst com- ponent of hieroglyph 姬 means ‘woman’ (his mother) and the second means ‘servant, minister’ (his father). In this regard we might consider the meaning of this surname as a ‘son of a woman and a servant’. In addition, there were Chinese surnames that originated from different sources: 1. Natural phenomena and the environment that refl ected the country’s fate, for example: Zhao (赵), Zheng (郑), Su (苏). 2. Surnames and clan names handed down to children by their famous ancient ancestors: Ren (任), Feng (风) etc. 3. From life occupational skills: Wu(巫) , Tu(屠), Bo (卜) etc. 4. Some of them were taken after bewailing the relatives’ death: Dai (戴), Zhao (召). 5. Mutual interaction between old Chinese ethnic minorities and Han which brought new traditions of giving a name and surname. All of the aforementioned facts describe the historical, cultural and so- 32 cial ways of the evolution of the Chinese name and surname. There is some distinction between the conceptions of a clan name and a surname as it was created when China was under the leadership of patriarchal society and used for the purpose of getting married to build up new respect- able families. The fact of presenting an offi cial emperor’s seal to the leader of a clan demonstrated his power and respect in the land he ruled. Even after the leader’s death according to all honorable achievements his title was still assigned to him forever. That was the difference between the common and privileged people of China as the former had a name and surname but didn’t have a clan name and, as a result, didn’t have the right to get married while the latter had an opportunity to be together if the husband belonged to a clan. It should be highlighted that it was impossible to contract a marriage with a man without a clan name. The reason for it was that Chinese people under- stood that intermarriage would be detrimental to the future generations. Finally, drawing a conclusion of this work and summing up all the de- scribed features of the Chinese name and the sources it originated from I wasn’t to say that Chinese name is an extremely important part of China’s culture and history. It goes back into immemorial prescription and has a rich and distinctive character. Nowadays, being used by modern industrial soci- ety, name has lost its subject matter it used to have in ancient times, but from the historical perspective, it goes without saying that the name until recent period is one of the fundamental features of Chinese culture. In China, name is not only a representative marker of a person it belongs to, it is also an original symbol that contains information about people’s customs, values and historical ideals. Bibliography 1. 《姓氏·名字·称谓》 中国历史文化知识丛书 籍秀琴 大象出版社 1997年. 2. 《中国姓氏文化》 陈建魁著 中原农民出版社. 3. 《中国人姓名的奥秘》 王泉根著 当代中国出版社. Е.А. Власова 4 курс, Институт переводоведения и многоязычия науч. рук. преп. Т.А. Цыбина Особенности перевода спортивной лексики Весь словарный состав языка условно можно разделить на области по тематике. Например, слова, которые можно отнести к теме «полити- ка», «наука», «культура» и т.д. Каждая из подобных групп имеет свои особенности, которые затрудняют деятельность переводчика. Не явля- 33.