The rulers of the Qing Dynasty came from Jianzhou Jurchen in the Northeast. The early rulers Nurhaci and Huang Taiji were less Chinese-speaking, although they themselves could speak Chinese and were familiar with "Romance of the Three Kingdoms" and "Water Margin" and other historical novels, but I don’t have a deep understanding of the Central Plains culture. Therefore, they did not adopt uniform rules for naming their descendants, which can be seen from the naming of their sons. For example, Huang Taiji's name should be "Huang Taiji", which is the Mongolian name for the tribal leader.
In 1644, Emperor Shunzhi settled in Beijing and began to establish his rule over the country. Emperor Shunzhi accepted Confucian education and began the process of sinicizing the Qing emperors, and the choice of names for future generations began to change. During Shunzhi's reign, he had eight sons, namely Niuniu, Fuquan, Xuanye, the fourth son of the emperor (born to Concubine Dong E, who died before being named), Changning, Qishou, Longxi and Yongqian. Judging from the meaning of their names, most of them are close to Chinese.
Emperor Kangxi ascended the throne in 1661. Kangxi reigned for 61 years. He was an emperor with a deep degree of Chinese culture. Influenced by Han culture, he established the following principles for naming his descendants: the first characters should be the same. ;The radicals of the second character are the same. Emperor Kangxi had 35 sons, 24 of whom are listed in the genealogy. The first character of the names of these 24 sons is "Yin", and the radical of the second character is "Menyi Pang", as people are more familiar with The eldest son of the emperor Yin, the crown prince Yin, the third son of the emperor Yin Zhi, the fourth son of the emperor Yin, the eighth son of the emperor Yin, the thirteenth son of the emperor Yin Xiang and so on. Although the words , , 知, and , are not commonly used, they all have the meaning of happiness and good fortune in their interpretation in ancient Chinese.
In 1722, Yin succeeded to the throne as Emperor Yongzheng. At the beginning of his accession to the throne, Emperor Yongzheng ordered that all brothers' names should no longer use the word "Yin", but should all be changed to "Yun", in order to avoid the emperor's name. The only Prince Yi, Yunxiang, had an unusual relationship with Yongzheng. After his death, he received permission from Yongzheng to adopt the character "Yin". Emperor Yongzheng had 10 sons, only 6 of whom were written in the jade ultimatum. The first character of their names is "Hong", and the second character contains the character "日", such as Honghui, Hongyun, Hongshi, Hongli (the traditional Chinese character is), Hongzhou (the modern calligrapher Qi Gong is his descendant ), Hong.
Emperor Qianlong came to the throne in 1735. Since he himself did not pay attention to taboos, his brothers all retained the word "Hong" in their names. Emperor Qianlong had 17 sons, three of whom died in infancy without being named. Emperor Qianlong chose the first character "Yong" for all his sons, and the second characters were all "Xie Yu Pang" (people usually call it "王之比", which is actually wrong), such as the emperor's eldest son Yong Huang, the emperor's second son Yong Lian, the emperor's third son Yong Zhang, the emperor's fourth son Yong, the fifth elder brother Yong Qi, the emperor's sixth son Yong, the emperor's seventh son Yong Cong, the emperor's eighth son Yong Xuan, the emperor's eleventh son Yong, the emperor's twelfth son Yong, the emperor's thirteenth son Yong, the emperor's fourteenth son Yonglu, Yongyan, the fifteenth son of the emperor, Yong, the seventeenth son of the emperor.
Once the sixth son of the emperor Yong painted a "Picture of the Years of the Year" dedicated to Qianlong's mother, his grandmother, the Empress Dowager Chongqing. Emperor Qianlong was very happy and inscribed the words "Yong Mian Yi Zai Feng Ci Yu" on it, which means that children and grandchildren will multiply and grow, and they will serve their mother for a long time. After that, Emperor Qianlong picked out the four characters "Yong, Mian, Yi and Zai" and used them as names for future generations.
In 1796, Emperor Qianlong abdicated and his fifteenth son, Yongyan, ascended the throne as Emperor Jiaqing. Usually the emperor's name is taboo in the world. The word "Yong" is a commonly used word. To avoid causing inconvenience to his brothers and to prevent his brothers from changing their names, Emperor Jiaqing changed his name to "Yan". Emperor Jiaqing had five sons. The eldest son died in infancy without being named. The others were Mianning (traditional Chinese characters:), Miankai, Mianxin, and Mianyu. The second character of the name all has the element of the radical "heart".
In 1820, Mianning came to the throne as Emperor Daoguang. After ascending the throne, Emperor Daoguang adopted the same approach as his father and changed his name to "Ning". At this time, the descendants of the clan were flourishing and multiplying, and the four characters "Yong, Mian, Yi, and Zai" determined by Emperor Qianlong were no longer enough. Therefore, Emperor Daoguang added the four characters "Pu, Yu, Heng, and Qi".
Emperor Daoguang had nine sons. The first character used the prescribed character "Yi", and the second character originally used the character "狕丝波". However, the eldest son Yiwei, the second son Yigang, and the third son Yiji died in infancy one after another. So Emperor Daoguang changed to "Yan Zi Pang" starting from the fourth son, the fourth son of the emperor Yi, the fifth son of the emperor Yi, the sixth son of the emperor Yi, the seventh son of the emperor Yi, the eighth son of the emperor Yi, and the ninth son of the emperor.
In 1831, Yi ascended the throne as Emperor Xianfeng. From then on, emperors no longer changed their names. Emperor Xianfeng had two sons, but only one survived, Zaichun, the son of Cixi. Although the emperor had no heirs, the royal family thrived and multiplied. Xianfeng added the four characters "Tao, Zeng and Qi". When Emperor Tongzhi died of illness in 1874, Cixi settled the world with one word and established the son of Prince Chun Yi as emperor. The radical of the second character of "Zai" is "三点水". Such as Zaifeng, Zaitao, Zaiyi and so on.
Emperor Guangxu died of acute poisoning on November 14, 1908. Before her death, Cixi made arrangements to make Puyi, the nephew of Emperor Guangxu and son of Prince Chun Zaifeng, the emperor. The second character of "楥" is written next to a single person, such as Puyi, Pujie (the traditional Chinese character is), etc. In 1912, the Qing government issued an edict announcing its abdication, and the royal family became civilians. During the Republic of China, although Puyi had abdicated, he still had a very high status in the hearts of the elderly and the young, at least he could be regarded as a "patriarch". So Puyi added twelve more words, "Jing, Zhi, Kai, Rui, Xi, Ying, Yuan, Sheng, Zheng, Zhao, Mao, Xiang".
Add the characters of the Qing Dynasty: Yin, Hong, Yong, Mian, Yi, Zai, Pu, Yu, Heng, Qi, Tao, Zeng, Qi, Jing, Zhi, Kai, Rui, Xi , Ying, Yuan, Sheng, Zheng, Zhao, Mao, Xiang. Generally speaking, the character Yin uses 绻 as the radical; the character Hong uses 日 as the radical; the character Yong uses the side of slanting jade as the radical; the character Mian uses the radical side of vertical heart; the character Yi uses yan as the radical; The character "氵" is the radical; the character "Pu" is the radical "任"; the character "Yu" is the radical "mountain". However, with the distance of blood relationship, the radicals of the character generation are not completely like this. For example, Prince Yi of Qing, who has been relatively popular recently, himself and future generations will not adopt the above principles.
Finally, to summarize, compared to the Ming Dynasty, the naming of the royal family in the Qing Dynasty was relatively scattered. The early rulers had a low degree of Chineseization and chose their names more casually. After taking over the Central Plains, the emperors began to accept the Han Central Plains culture, and there were certain rules for the selection of names. However, there was no more accurate regulation on the specific naming, especially the radical of the second character in the name.