Tuesday, June 24, 2014

My roots... part 1

Chén (traditional Chinese: 陳; simplified Chinese: 陈; pinyin: Chén; Wade-Giles: Ch'en) is one of the most common Chinese family names. It ranks at the 5th most popular surname in Mainland China and the most popular surname in Singapore and Taiwan. Chen is also the most common family name in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Fujian (spelled Tan or Chin in Singapore and Malaysia), Hong Kong (spelt Chan in Hong Kong) and Macau. It is usually romanised as Chan in Cantonese, and sometimes as Chun. In Min (including dialects of Chaozhou (Teochow), Hainan, Fujian, and Taiwan), the name is pronounced Tan. In Hakka and Toisan, the name is spelt and pronounced as Chin. Some other Romanisations include Zen (from Wu), Ding and Chern

In Vietnam, this surname is written in Quoc Ngu as Trần, and is the second most popular Vietnamese surname, accounting for 11% of the population,[1] after the surname Nguyễn (38.4%).

Chen is also a Hebrew name used by Israelis. It is pronounced khen, and means grace or favour

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