The surname Qu is the 164th surname in China, accounting for approximately 0.06% of the country's Han population.
The surname Qu (Qū) has a pure origin and has two origins:
1. It comes from the surname Ji, which is named after the place. According to "Customs", during the ancient Zhou Dynasty, King Wu of Zhou enfeoffed his third son in the land of Jin. This prince was named Shu Yu. Shuyu's eighth-generation grandson was the Marquis of Jin Mu in the Spring and Autumn Period of Jin. Marquis Mu of Jin appointed his youngest son as the leader of Quwo (in the northeast of present-day Wenxi County, Shanxi Province). The name of the fiefdom was used as the surname, which was the Quwo family. Later, it was changed to the single surname Qu, and then the Qu family was passed down from generation to generation.
2. Comes from the surname Ju.
The surname Ju comes from the surname Ji and is a descendant of the Yellow Emperor. The Yellow Emperor was named Qi (Houji), the ancestor of the Zhou Dynasty. Qi's son Bucheng had a son named Tao. When he was born, the palm writing on his hand resembled the ancient Chinese character "Ju", so he was named Ju Tao. Ju Tao later became the leader of the Zhou people, and his descendants took his name and called them Ju. First name and surname.
In addition: Among the descendants of Ju Tao, there was a man named Ju Wu who served as a doctor in the State of Yan. His descendants named him after him and called him Ju. For a long time, the story of "Ju Qu's family" has been circulating among some families with the surname Ju and Qu in Northeast and Shandong. It is said that the surname Ju was a high-ranking official in a certain dynasty in the past. Because he "offended" the emperor, he was punished and executed. The surname Ju fled one after another. On the way to escape, they were chased by the army. The army asked: What is your surname? Answer: The surname is Ju. Because the accent of the dialect was too strong, the officers and soldiers misunderstood him as surname Qu, so he escaped disaster. There is also a story about the early general Ju Fulu who died for his country in the battle. His descendants were granted the title of Dingyuan Marquis somewhere in Yunnan by Zhu Yuanzhang. Later, they were executed for offending the uncle of the country (the father of Xigong), and the county magistrate wanted to save him. He asked: "Do you want to surrender or not?" The answer was: "Qu", so he changed the bow to a song. And so the surnames of Ju who managed to escape from this disaster were all given the surname Qu, but only when they were alive. After death, the surname must be changed back to Ju when a monument is erected, which is called "living Qu and dead Ju".
Although these stories may seem absurd, they are widely circulated among some families surnamed Ju and Qu. Some friends surnamed Qu recalled that they had seen "I Qu" on the tombstone of their ancestors before the Cultural Revolution. The surname is passed down from generation to generation." What is going on? To understand the whole story, we must start with the following story.
It is said that in the third year of Jianping (4 BC) of Emperor Ai of the Western Han Dynasty, in the fiefdom of Liu Yun, King of Dongping, "in the middle of Hushan Mountain, there was a big stone standing on its side, nine feet and six inches high. It was moved one foot from its original location. The news spread far and near, causing an uproar." It turned out to be a perfectly rectangular boulder that was lying down. It had no legs and no one was moving it, but it rolled over and stood up on its own. King Dongping had a premonition that it was not a good sign (people at that time were all superstitious), so he built a mountain of earth in the shape of Hushan in his palace, erected a stone statue on it, and planted yellow grass so that he could pray at any time. This incident was known to two deceivers who were "waiting for call" in the capital, one named Xi Fu Gong (surname) and the other Sun Chong. They made a big fuss about it and spread rumors to gain the emperor's trust. The purpose of conferring official titles and titles. So he wrote to Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty and said that Liu Yun had "made a stone in the palace to destroy the imperial court. He wanted more than he wanted, and he carried out Huo Xian's plan and the Jing Ke Rebellion." He asked a regular attendant to forward the letter to Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty. The sentence "The plan of Huo Xian was carried out and the change of Jing Ke" stung Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty, so he immediately issued an order to depose Liu Yun as a commoner without investigating or verifying it seriously, and all other people involved were executed. Tingwei Liang Xiang, Minister Ling Ju Tan, and Pushe Zongbo Feng hurriedly submitted a memorial to stop him, and urged Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty to pay more attention to the evidence and not to believe the confession. The angry Emperor Ai of the Han Dynasty sentenced him to "I don't know how to hate evil and beg for thieves, but I want to wait and see, and the crime is the same." "Equal", these three were also expelled from the imperial court and reduced to civilian positions. Ju Tan and his son Ju Lin (pronounced "closed") fled to Xiping, Liangzhou (known as Xidu in ancient times, now Xining City) and changed their surname to Qu. This is what is recorded in "Hanshu", "Customs", "Zizhi Tongjian" and "Yuanhe Surname Compilation", "Ju Tan changed to Qu", "Taken refuge in Huangzhong, because he lived in Xiping" and "Ju Qu is from the same clan" "The source of this true historical story.
For a long period of time since then, Ju Tan's descendants have always developed along both sides of the Huangshui River, and have even become a large and famous Qu family group in the history of the northwest region. The ancient people of Jincheng in Xizhou said, "There are countless cattle and sheep when you are drinking rice and wine; you have a red gate in the south and a brothel in the north." This shows its wealth and power. During the late Eastern Han Dynasty and the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the Qu family produced many famous generals, such as the powerful general Qu Yi, who was as famous as Hebei general Yan Liang Wen Chou, and Han Sui and Ma Chaoyao fought against Cao Cao and guarded Xiliang. The war general Qu Yan (Yan) of the Western Jin Dynasty, as well as the chief governor of Emperor Min of the Western Jin Dynasty to Qu Yun of Zuopushe, etc. During the Southern and Northern Dynasties, Qujia, the famous Gaochang king in the Western Regions, also came from Yuzhong, Jincheng. The Qu family passed down through 9 generations in the 134 years since Gaochang was founded, and was finally attacked and destroyed by Hou Junji, the general of Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty. Qu Jia's tenth grandson Qu (Qu) Chongyu was very famous during the Wu Zetian era and was awarded the title of Jiaohe County Prince of Zuowuwei General. In the Tang Dynasty, a branch of the family surnamed Qu migrated from Xizhou to Wuxing, Jiangsu (now Huzhou). The "Book of Tang" says: Qu Xinling, native of Wuxing, was the magistrate of Wangjiang County in the eleventh year of Emperor Taizong's reign in Zhenguan. When there was a severe drought, Qu Xinling led his officials to set up incense tables and pray for the people day after day. Because of his persistence, God was moved by heavy rains, which alleviated the drought. At the same time, it also moved the common people, and they spontaneously built an ancestral hall for him. The famous poet Bai Juyi specially wrote a poem "Qin Zhong Yin" for him. He has not heard of the capital. When he died and wanted to be buried, the people covered the road. He was not allowed to climb the pole, so he was buried on the river bank. Even now, when his name is known, men and women weep. No one has erected a monument, and only the people in the city know it." There is a couplet that praises him: "I prayed for nectar, Juyi wrote poems to benefit the government; he was a wealthy family, and he spread rumors in Xizhou and looked at the rich families." He was a good county magistrate who was deeply supported by the people.
However, such a historically vigorous Qu family suddenly disappeared after the Song Dynasty. Their name was unknown, their surname was not recorded in the classics, and no one with the surname Qu has been found in mainland China so far. What happened in the meantime? What happened? Where did the huge Qu family group go? To know the difference, we have to start with "Hundred Family Surnames".
It is said that "One Hundred Family Surnames" has a history of more than a thousand years since it was compiled into a textbook, printed and published by a Confucian scholar in Qiantang County in the early Southern Song Dynasty. During this period, three versions were circulated. The arrangement of the surnames in these three versions is similar, with the only difference being the sentence "Zhen Qu's family title". One is the "Zhen Qu Family Feng" in the traditional Chinese character "Hundred Family Surnames", the other is the "Zhen Qu Family Feng" in the simplified Chinese character "Hundred Family Surnames", and the third is the "Zhen Wei Family Feng". Among these three versions, the one that records "Zhen Qu Family's Feng" is undoubtedly a continuation of the original version, the one that records "Zhen Qu's Family Feng" is a simplified version of the original surname, and the one that records "Zhen Wei's Family Feng" is the wrong version. Therefore, it is determined to be a wrong version because the eighth sentence in the above three versions all records "Jin Wei Tao Jiang". Since the "Wei" surname has been edited in the previous version, how can it be edited again later. From the traditional "Zhen Qu Family Feng" to the simplified "Zhen Qu Family Feng", just one word difference has vividly expressed the process of converting the surname Qu into the surname Qu.
In addition, there is a famous four-character couplet in the ancestral hall of the surname Qu, "A famous family in Jincheng, a famous family in Quanjun" can also prove this change in the use of characters for surnames. A friend surnamed Qu explained the couplets and said that the first couplet refers to "Qujian" in Jincheng and the second couplet refers to "Quzhen" in Jiuquan. He also added the note "Qujian is a prominent family in Jincheng in the Western Jin Dynasty". Following this line of thinking, the author consulted a large amount of historical materials but could not find the person who "wrongly saw" it. After further analysis, I believe that the so-called "wrongly seen" person is actually a misspelling of "Quyun", and this Quyun is exactly what was recorded above. The abbreviation of Qu Yun, a wealthy Jincheng family. If this inference is true, the character "麴" in the upper couplet and the character "qu" in the second couplet evolved along the glyph structure of "麴-qu-qu", where the character qu is a variant of the character 麴, and the character qu is a variant of the character qu. simplify.
As for the origin of the Qu surname, I have seen many opinions on the Internet recently, and they all said: "According to "Customs": In the Spring and Autumn Period, Jin Muhou granted the young son to become a teacher in Quwo, and his descendants named him after the place. As a surname, it is called Qu's surname.
"In order to verify the reliability of this argument, the author reviewed and studied the modern version of "Sikuquanshu Customs" throughout the article, and also consulted the annotations of Qian Daxin and others in the Qing Dynasty who were the editors of "Sikuquanshu". We also consulted Wang Liqi's annotation of "Customs of Customs". The original name of "Customs of Customs" was written by Ying Shao in the late Eastern Han Dynasty. Some of the thirty-six volumes of "Customs of Customs" were lost in the Song Dynasty (including surnames). Chapter), when the Ming Dynasty edited "Yongle Dadian", it was supplemented based on records in some classics. The supplemented and edited "Yongle Dadian Customs General Meaning" basically reflects the full picture of Ying's original work. The Qing Dynasty's "Sikuquanshu" chapter is Compiled based on the "Yongle Dadian" of the Ming Dynasty, the "Sikuquanshu" contains ten volumes of the main text of "Customs of Customs" and an additional volume of "Unknown Texts of Customs" (including the chapter on surnames); in "The Collection of Customs and Surnames", Ying's family name is included. A collection of more than 530 surnames that existed in the late Eastern Han Dynasty. There is no record of the surname Qu or that the Qu family got its surname from Uncle Qu Wohuan. It only found "Ju family, the Han Dynasty minister ordered Ju Tan, or It is the Qu (Qu) surname (some versions directly edit it into the Qu surname). The pronunciation is changed, and the Han Dynasty has the Qu Yan and Han surnames. In addition to the record of "thinking of the surname", Uncle Qu Wohuan's name does not appear. I don't know which customs the people who hold this statement reproduced it from.
Some people say that " The surname Qu originated from Xia Minister Qu Ni and Qin Yushi Qu Gong." The author believes that the Xia Minister Qu Ni and Qin Yushi Qu Gong recorded in historical records are most likely to "specifically refer to personal names", just like Confucius's student "Zi Lu" "The same as "Ziyou". If the surname Qu had indeed been established at that time and had a normal surname inheritance, then why are these two people clearly recorded in "Historical Records" together with their surnames in "Customs" and "Customs"? Why are they not included in the masterpieces of surnames such as "Yuanhe Surnames" and "Hundred Family Surnames" that span more than a thousand years? In fact, many friends with the surname Qu also have doubts about the above point of view. It is obvious that my family origin is from How come the Ju family suddenly became a descendant of "Uncle Quwohuan", "Quni" and "Qugong"? No wonder some friends with the surname Qu exclaimed: "Our surname Qu is really special." There is no such thing in "Continuation of Hundred Family Surnames", where did the surname Qu come from?"
The above facts show us a historical picture of the evolution of surnames covering a vast space and time: in the late Western Han Dynasty Ju Tan abandoned Ju and changed it to Qu to avoid disaster. After more than 900 years of development, the surname Qu gradually evolved from the late Tang Dynasty to the late Southern Song Dynasty and became abbreviated as Qu. This is the "Qu" that is spread among some families with the surnames of Ju and Qu. The true origin of "the ancestors abandoned Ju and changed the tune to avoid disaster", "the Juqu family" and "the dead Ju and live tune". And I think that this abbreviation is limited to the abbreviation of the evolution of the surname and does not include the meaning of font simplification, because " The word "qu" is also an ancient Chinese character. Qu and qu as Chinese characters had completely different meanings in ancient times, just like "Qufu" and "Quwo" in history certainly cannot be written as "qufu" and "quwo".
In addition, a "Donglai Qu Family Genealogy" revised in the first year of Xuantong can also prove that a considerable part of the Chinese Qu family are derived from the Ju family. In this genealogy revised by Qu himself, the section "Test of Qu's Genealogy" records: "Old legend has it that (Qu's) is a descendant of Gongbao with the surname Ju. The ancestor Yuan Ying served as the prime minister of the Yuan Dynasty, and his native place was Huang County. In Wengzhong, in the north of the city, the tomb table still exists. Due to the misfortune, many of the tribes changed their names and settled here, so they changed their names to Qu. Although there is no evidence of this, the ancestors have written about it in detail for hundreds of years. "It means: According to legend, the distant ancestor of our Qu family was a high-ranking official with the surname Ju, who was one of the Three Gongs and Nine Ministers in the imperial court. This official fled to his hometown due to disaster and became known as Ju. Although the legend cannot be verified, it has been passed down orally by our ancestors for hundreds of generations, so it should have some basis and cannot be nonsense. The author believes that the Gongbao-level senior official surnamed Ju described in the "Genealogy of the Donglai Qu Family" is the Western Han Dynasty Minister Ling Ju Tan recorded in historical records.
After Ju Tan was changed to Qu, the surname Qu has been living and multiplying in the northwest region. As the family continued to grow and finally declined, the surname also continued to evolve along the glyph structure of "Ju-Qu-Qu-Qu". For example, in life In the early Tang Dynasty, Qu Chongyu was recorded as "Qu Chongyu" or "Qu Chengyu" in some historical records. From this, it can be seen that the evolution of the Qu surname from Qu to Qu had just been completed in the early Tang Dynasty. The earliest abbreviation of the Qu surname to "Qu" was in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. From the "Qu Yuanzhen Epitaph" unearthed in Luoyang, Henan Province, it can be seen that by the second year of Huichang in the Tang Dynasty (AD 842), part of the Qu surname had already followed the line of "Qu- The glyph evolution sequence of "qu - qu" was first abbreviated to "qu", and in the late Southern Song Dynasty, this glyph evolution limited to surnames was finally completed. From then on, the surname Qu began to gradually withdraw from the stage of history, and was replaced by the more convenient "qu" replaced. Just think about it, otherwise, where would the huge and famous Qu family in history be?
In fact, in history, every time someone with the Ju surname encountered a disaster, they would in turn be attached to the Qu surname, and they were known as "Death Ju and live Qu". This may be the reason for the "Ju Qu family" complex
For a long time, in some families with the surname Ju and Qu in the Shandong Peninsula, there has been a saying that "the Ju Qu family" and "the Ju Qu family lives". According to folk legend, in the late Northern Song Dynasty, Ju Gao, a descendant of Ju Yan, a native of Yeji County, Shandong Province, wrote a letter to impeach Prime Minister Zhang Dun after becoming a Jinshi. As a result, he was brutally retaliated and was convicted and exterminated. At that time, the Ju clan members fled one after another, and later many people were forced to change their surnames to the closely-sounding "Qu". However, they were still recorded as the Ju clan in genealogies and tombstones. Therefore, since the Jin and Yuan Dynasties, there has been "Dead Ju Live Qu" , the legend of "Juqu's family". Another theory is that at the end of the Yuan Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, a son of a meritorious official named Ju offended his uncle and was sentenced to annihilation. The county magistrate wanted to save him, so he asked: "Will you surrender?" The answer was: "Qu (qu)", so many people People with the surname Ju changed their name from Ju to Qu. It was not until the Yongzheng period of the Qing Dynasty that some of the Qu clansmen who were formed from this restored the surname Ju, and more Qu clansmen have continued the surname Qu to this day. Of course, the "Ju Qu family" mentioned here is limited to those who changed from Ju to Qu, and those who were originally Qu are not included in this list.
The surname Qu is a very popular surname in Laizhou. According to the population, it ranks 11th after Wang, Zhang, Li, Liu, Sun, Yang, Xu, Zhao, Ren and Yu. (see the statistical table of "Laizhou City Chronicles: Surnames"), among which the Zheng Village area in Shahe Town is where the Qu clan, which was changed from Ju to Qu, lives together. Zhengcun has been inhabited since before the Yuan Dynasty. Mao Zhi, a man from the Qing Dynasty, once praised Zhengcun in his book "Shi Xiaolu" as "the land is close to a big river, and there are many beautiful trees in the shade, which is also called prosperity". Later, due to the increase in population, Zhengcun Soon, it was divided into four administrative villages: Dongzheng, Xizheng, Nanzheng and Beizheng. Most of the residents had the surname Qu. Later, villages such as Daqujia were also divided. There are more than 1,000 households in Shahe Town alone. The ancestor of this Qu surname is named Ju Jin. He served as the governor's transfer envoy in the Yuan Dynasty and moved from Huang County to Ye County. It was not until the Republic of China that the county magistrate Liu Guobin presided over the compilation of "Si Xuye County Chronicles". Ju Jin still existed in the southwest of Xizheng Village. On the tombstone, the words "the twenty-fourth year of the Yuan Dynasty" can still be faintly seen. Both Yuan Shizu in the early Yuan Dynasty and Emperor Yuan Shun in the late Yuan Dynasty had the year name "Zhiyuan". The former used it for 31 years (1264-1294), while the latter only used it for 6 years (1335-1340). Therefore, the "Zhiyuan" here "The twenty-fourth year of the Yuan Dynasty" should be the twenty-fourth year of the Yuan Dynasty, that is, 1287 AD.