Chang (surname)

Chang (/tʃɑːŋ/)[1] is the pinyin romanization of the Chinese surname 常 (Cháng). It was listed 80th among the Song-era Hundred Family Surnames.

Not to be confused with Chang (surname 昌), Zhang (surname), or Zhang (surname 章).
Chang (常)
Origin
Word/nameOld Chinese
Region of originChina

"Chang" is also the Wade-Giles romanization of two Chinese surnames written Zhang in pinyin: one extremely common and written 張 in Traditional Chinese and 张 in Simplified Chinese, and another quite rare and written as 章 in both systems. There is also a rare case of 鄭 in Hong Kong written as Chang as well. For full details on them, see the "Zhang" 章 and "Zheng" 鄭 article. In Macao, this is the spelling of the surname "Zeng" 曾. "Chang" is also a common spelling of the surname 陈/陳 (Chen in Mandarin pinyin) in Peru.

Romanization

常 is romanized as Ch'ang in Wade-Giles, although the apostrophe is often omitted in practice. It is romanized as Soeng and Sheung in Cantonese; Seong and Siông in Minnan languages; and Sioh in Teochew. It is occasionally romanized Sōng and Thōng as well.

It is the source of the Vietnamese surname Thường and the Korean surname romanized as Sang (상). It is also another Romanization of the Korean surname Jang.

In Japanese, it is romanized as Jō.

Distribution

常 was unlisted among the most recent rankings of the 100 most common Chinese surnames in mainland China and on Taiwan based on household registrations in 2007, although the Ministry of Public Security in 2008 listed it as the 87th most common surname in China based on its database of National Identity Cards, shared by at least 2.4 million Chinese citizens.[2] It was the 94th-most-common surname during the 1982 Chinese census.

张 is the third-most-common surname in mainland China, making up 6.83% of the population of the People's Republic of China, although there it is officially rendered into the Latin alphabet as Zhang.[3] Its Traditional Chinese variant 張 is the fourth-most-common surname in Taiwan, making up 5.26% of the population of the Republic of China.[4]

"Chang" is a common Chinese surname in the United States, ranked 687th among all surnames during the 1990 census and 424th during the year 2000 census.[5] It was ranked 11th among all surnames held by Asians and Pacific Islanders and 6th among all surnames held by Chinese Americans in 2000, well ahead of the pinyin variant "Zhang".[6]

"Chang" is a common surname in Peru, where it was adopted by Cantonese immigrants as a variant spelling of Chen (陈 or 陳).

Origin

The pronunciation of Chang in Old Chinese has been reconstructed as *daŋ. Its original meaning was "constant" or "often". By the time of Middle Chinese, the pronunciation had shifted to Dzyang.[7]

Notable people with the surname Chang

See also

References
  1. "Chang". Collins English Dictionary.
  2. "中国最新300大姓排名（2008 [Statistics on the number of citizens with each surname in China, based on records of National Identity Cards]." 2009-01-06. Accessed 20 Jun 2015.(in Chinese)
  3. "公安部统计：'王'成中国第一大姓 有9288万人 [Public Security Bureau Statistics: 'Wang' Found China's #1 'Big Family', Includes 92.88m People]." 24 Apr 2007. Accessed 27 Mar 2012.(in Chinese)
  4. 中华百家姓-千字文-国学经典-文化经典. "中国台湾姓氏排行 Archived 2013-10-16 at the Wayback Machine [Taiwan (China) Surname Ranking]". 8 Jun 2010. Accessed 1 Apr 2012. (in Chinese)
  5. US Census Bureau. Public Broadcasting Service. "How Popular Is Your Last Name?" Accessed 6 Apr 2012.
  6. United States Census Bureau. "Genealogy Data: Frequently Occurring Surnames from Census 2000". 27 Sept 2011. Accessed 29 Mar 2012.
  7. Baxter, Wm. H. & Sagart, Laurent. "Baxter–Sagart Old Chinese Reconstruction". Archived from the original on 2013-09-27. (1.93 MB), p. 33. 2011. Accessed 11 October 2011.
  8. Xinhua News Agency. "秘鲁改组内阁 华裔 何塞·陈出任总理". Archived from the original on September 24, 2010. 15 September 2010. Accessed 22 December 2016.
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