Zhu Yuanzhang, the founder of the Ming Dynasty, was a very powerful figure. He not only worried about the things during his term of office, but also wanted to finish all the work for future generations. He has formulated many rules and benefits for future generations, so that they can enjoy them according to the implementation.
This includes how to give Zhu Jiazi and grandchildren those wonderful chemical element-like names. In the feudal era, although the naming of members of the royal family was exquisite and elegant, it was the same as the basic rules followed by most ordinary people in China: surname+seniority+single name. But for the Ming Dynasty, the founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang had a limited personal education. Although he was a monk, he believed in Taoism more, learned some mysterious divination techniques and made interesting attempts. The naming method of Prince Daming, including the origin of the Ming dynasty, is to conform to the theory of five elements of yin and yang in ancient metaphysics. Daming was founded in 1368. According to the so-called numerology at that time, Daming belonged to Shuide. That's why it was set in Yingtian, which is now Nanjing. Because there is an individual named Jinling in Nanjing, that is to say, in order to meet the five elements.
according to his idea, the names of Zhu's children and grandchildren must conform to the cycle of "five virtues always say", so that the dynasty can flourish for a long time. He has 26 sons, and all the names given to his sons are beside the wooden characters, such as Prince Zhu Biao, the second son Zhu Shang, the third son Zhu, the prince Zhu Di, and Zhu Yuanzhang's 26 sons. At that time, it was estimated that he had not looked up the dictionary less, and there were already many rare words in it, such as Zhu, Zhu, Zhu and Zhu. Since the three generations of Zhu, surnames are naturally fixed, and so are generations. Zhu Yuanzhang has long drawn up the word "Zi" for the descendants of more than 2 sons, such as Zhu Di's "looking forward to Qi and seeing you, carrying Yi Chang, kindness and grace are equal, and Jane Jingdi is the first to care". The single names of each prince and grandson should be related to Jin Mu's fire, water and soil, and they should be sorted according to the five elements. For example, Emperor Jiajing's name is Zhu Houzong, and his son's name has to be related to the earth, that is, the sons of Qin Long Emperor Zhu Zaihou and Qin Long, and the native gold is the Wanli Emperor Zhu Yijun. This system is really a test of the cultural level of the Zhu family. Rao is the essence of Zhu Yuanzhang's calculation, and there are so many Chinese characters!
The phenomenon of duplicate names is put an end to through the generations of each branch, but it is impossible to hold that every descendant of the royal family is pampered. It is said that there were millions of royal families at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and the names of these millions of people should be forced into the above rule, but they cannot be duplicated. The result can be imagined. At first, you can pick some words with good meanings, but later, all the words are used up, so the names of future generations must be avoided, and you can't use what your ancestors used, which makes it more difficult to name them later. Those who were born late had to "create words" now. Although it was not a patent of the Ming Dynasty royal family, the Ming Dynasty royal family did make words to the extreme. Many people's names became uncommon words, and they were not pleasant to read. For example, the Zhu Five Dynasties and Zhu Ten Dynasties should be named after the "gold" series, but there were so few Chinese characters beside the ancient gold characters that they could not all be named silver, copper and iron, so they had to rack their brains to create a lot of words.
then why is the name of the Ming dynasty prince so similar to the periodic table of elements? It's not that the Ming dynasty mastered any chemical knowledge in advance, nor did Wenjielev accidentally cross it! In fact, this pot has to be carried by Xu Shou, a pioneer of chemistry in the late Qing Dynasty. In the 196s, when Mendeleev's periodic table of chemical elements was introduced to China, scientist Xu Shou was ready to launch a Chinese version. He encountered the same problem when naming the royal family in the Ming Dynasty, and he had to rack his brains to find suitable Chinese characters for one-to-one correspondence. Unexpectedly, the Zhu family had solved this problem for him hundreds of years in advance by mistake. Xu shou actually found inspiration in the genealogy of the Ming dynasty royal family, beside the metal, beside the word fire, etc., plus a transliteration of Chinese characters. For example, Na used the name of Zhu Zaina, the king of Ruijin. If the world is really wonderful, the names of the sons and grandsons have actually helped science a lot.
Zhu Yuanzhang
Xu Shou