Baixing

Chinese family names are patrilineal, passed from father to children.[6][7] Chinese women, after marriage, typically retain their birth surname.[8] Two distinct types of Chinese surnames existed in ancient China, namely xing (Chinese: 姓; pinyin: xìng) or ancestral clan names, and shi (Chinese: 氏; pinyin: shì) or branch lineage names. Later, the two terms began to be used interchangeably, and now, xing refers to the surname while shi may be used to refer to the clan name or maiden name. Historically, only Chinese men possessed xìng (Chinese: 姓; lit. 'family name'), in addition to shì (Chinese: 氏; lit. 'clan'); the women had only the latter and took on their husband's xìng after marriage.[8]

A confederation of tribes living along the Yellow River were the ancestors of what later became the Han ethnic group in China.[9][10] During the Warring States (475–221 BCE) several large tribes, including the Huangdi tribes (Chinese: 黄帝族), Yandi tribes (Chinese: 炎帝族), and the Yi tribes formed an alliance which consisted of roughly 100 tribes, hence the origin of the Baixing Chinese: 百姓, or the "hundred surnames".[11]

The Hundred Family Surnames (Chinese: 百家姓), commonly known as Bai Jia Xing,[12] is a classic Chinese text composed of common Chinese surnames.[13] The book was composed in the early Song dynasty.[14] It originally contained 411 surnames, and was later expanded to 504.[14] In the dynasties following the Song, the Three Character Classic, the Hundred Family Surnames, and Thousand Character Classic came to be known as San Bai Qian (Three, Hundred, Thousand), from the first character in their titles, and were the almost universal introductory literary texts for students, almost exclusively boys, from elite backgrounds and even for a number of ordinary villagers.[15][16]