Watchtowers of Zili village rising from the rice paddies of the Qiangya village cluster in Tangkou, Kaiping.

The Fang (方) Surname: From the Fall of the Song Court to the Towers of Kaiping

The Fang (方) Surname: From the Fall of the Song Court to the Towers of Kaiping Fang (方, fāng; Fong in Cantonese-speaking communities) is one of the most portable surnames in the Chinese world — a single character that turns up in the phone books of Vancouver, San Francisco, Havana, and Singapore. In China alone…

1 day ago0Comments

BySteven

The entrance doorway of the Situ Clan Library (司徒氏图书馆) in Chikan, Kaiping — the door of the library the overseas clan raised 40,000 silver dollars to build.

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

The Situ (司徒) Surname: From a Zhou Court Office to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Situ (司徒) Surname: From a Zhou Court Office to the Wuyi Diaspora A Name That Was Once an Office The Situ (司徒, Sītú) surname is one of the few office-derived compound surnames (官职姓, guānzhíxìng) to survive from Chinese antiquity — it began as the Zhou-dynasty office of Minister of Lands and Education (地官大司徒, dìguān…

4 days ago0Comments

BySteven

Chinese Genealogy How-To Guides Primary Sources

How to Find Your Family’s Qiaopi Letters: A Hands-On Guide to Wuyi Remittance Archives

How to Find Your Family's Qiaopi Letters: A Hands-On Guide to Wuyi Remittance Archives Between roughly 1850 and 1950, millions of men from the Siyi (四邑) and Wuyi (五邑) counties of Guangdong left for the gold fields, railroads, laundries, and kitchens of North America, Australia, and Southeast Asia — and many of them wrote home.…

August 26, 20260Comments

BySteven

Yunhuan Lou and other diaolou watchtowers at Zili Village, Kaiping — remittance-built towers of the qiaoxiang, material husks of the reunion dream.

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

The Han (韩) Surname: From the Warring States to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Han (韩) Surname: From the Warring States to the Wuyi Diaspora The Han (韩) surname descends from the royal house of a kingdom of the Warring States — the State of Han (韩国, Hánguó), founded when Han Wan (韩万, Hán Wàn), grandson of Duke Wu of Quwo, was enfeoffed at Hanyuan (韩原, Hányuán) in…

August 25, 20260Comments

BySteven

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

The Yuan (袁) Surname: From the State of Chen to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Yuan (袁) Surname: From the State of Chen to the Wuyi Diaspora The Name Before the Place Most Chinese surnames are named for a place. A king granted a fief; the family took the fief's name; the name outlived the fief. The surname Yuan (袁姓, Yuán xìng) did not begin this way. It began…

August 14, 20260Comments

BySteven

Interior of a Taishan ancestral hall with spirit tablets, incense, and ceremonial offerings

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

The Pan (潘) Surname: From the State of Pan to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Pan (潘) Surname: From the State of Pan to the Wuyi Diaspora The Pan surname traces to two royal lineages of ancient China. The first descends from the ruling house of the State of Pan (潘国, Pānguó), a small vassal polity of the Zhou period whose princes shared the blood of the Zhou kings;…

August 13, 20260Comments

BySteven

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

The Zeng (曾) Surname: From Confucian Lineage to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Zeng (曾) Surname: From Confucian Lineage to the Wuyi Diaspora A Sage's Name: The Kingdom That Became the Surname The Zeng (曾, Zēng) surname carries a Confucian pedigree no other Wuyi surname can claim: its first ancestor is 曾子 (Zēngzǐ, Zengzi), the disciple Confucius made the model of filial piety and later canonized as…

August 7, 20260Comments

BySteven

Facade of the Wanggang Li ancestral hall in Baiyun, Guangzhou — a protected heritage building among the Li clan's standing ancestral monuments

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

The Li (黎) Surname: From the Ancient State of Li to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Li (黎) Surname: From the Ancient State of Li to the Wuyi Diaspora The Siyi region of Guangdong sent over two million people overseas between 1840 and 1940 — and among the surnames carried in that great crossing was 黎 (Li), a name whose written form had already endured for over two thousand years,…

August 6, 20260Comments

BySteven

Chinese Surnames Surname Archive

Chen Surname: Meaning, Origin, and China’s Most Common Family Name

Water Has Ten Thousand Branches but One Source 56| In 1225 on a hillside in northern Guangdong, one man gathered his family and made a pact. His name was 陈辉 (Chén Huī), honorifically called 凤台公 (Fèngtái Gōng, Honorable Fengtai). He was a Song-dynasty jinshi (进士), the highest imperial examination degree, who served as Imperial…

July 13, 20260Comments

BySteven

A group of early Taishanese migrants in Cuba, carrying woven baskets and personal belongings, symbolizing their journey from Guangdong to a new life abroad.

Emigration Stories

What Happened to the Chinese in Cuba? The Untold Story of Havana’s Lost Chinatown

In the mid-1800s, a young man from Taishan, Guangdong, stood on the deck of a ship bound for Havana, Cuba. He wasn’t alone—thousands of others from his hometown had made the same journey, carrying little more than hope and a fierce determination to survive. Back home, poverty and social unrest had left few options. For…

March 25, 20250Comments

BySteven

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The Fang (方) Surname: From the Fall of the Song Court to the Towers of Kaiping

The Situ (司徒) Surname: From a Zhou Court Office to the Wuyi Diaspora

How to Find Your Family’s Qiaopi Letters: A Hands-On Guide to Wuyi Remittance Archives

The Han (韩) Surname: From the Warring States to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Yuan (袁) Surname: From the State of Chen to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Pan (潘) Surname: From the State of Pan to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Zeng (曾) Surname: From Confucian Lineage to the Wuyi Diaspora

The Li (黎) Surname: From the Ancient State of Li to the Wuyi Diaspora

Chen Surname: Meaning, Origin, and China’s Most Common Family Name

What Happened to the Chinese in Cuba? The Untold Story of Havana’s Lost Chinatown

Yamen 1279: The Battle That E...

Haiyan Overseas Chinese Farm:...

What Is Qiaopi? A Beginner&#8...

The Meijia Courtyard of Duanf...

The Women Who Left: Chinese F...

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