Ding (surname)

Ding
Family name
Region of origin	China
Related names	al-din

Ding (Chinese: 丁; pinyin: Dīng; Wade–Giles: Ting) is the simplest written Chinese family name in existence (the only two characters that are simpler are "一" and "乙"). It is written in two strokes and is first on the Chinese surname stroke order.

Speculated origins

Ding is the 46th most common surname in China. There are four main sources of the Dings:

1) The earliest record of this surname in history was the duke of Ding during the Shang Dynasty.

2) Came from the last name of Jiang. The youngest son of Qi Tai Gong, Qi Ding Gong was a high-ranking judge during the reigns of Zhou Cheng Wang and Zhou Kang Wang. After his death, his descendents used his middle name as their last name to commemorate him.

3) During Chun Qiu period, the descendents of a judge called Song Ding Gong, also used Ding as their last name.

4) During the Three Kingdoms period, a general, Sun Kuang of the Wu kingdom, accidentally burnt the food supply and as a punishment, the king Sun Quan ordered this general to change his last name to Ding (the king did not want to bear the same last name as this guilty general.)

Hometown: North west of Dingtao in the Shandong Province of eastern China.^[1]

Hui Chinese

Among the Chinese Muslims, the surname Ding is thought to originate from the last syllable of the Arabic honorific "ud-Din", as seen e.g. in the name of the Bukharan Muslim Sayyid Ajjal Shams ud-Din (1210-1279; also spelled al-Din), who was appointed Governor of Yunnan by the Mongol Yuan dynasty.^[2] In particular, descent from Sayyid Ajjal Shams ud-Din, known in Chinese as Saidianchi Shansiding (赛典赤赡思丁), is attested in the Ding lineage of Chendai, near Quanzhou in Fujian.^[3][2]

A Hui legend in Ningxia links four surnames common in the region - Na, Su, La, and Ding - with the descendants of Shams al-Din's son named Nasruddin, who "divided" their ancestor's name (Nasulading, in Chinese) among themselves.^[4]

The Ding clan continues to be one of the well known Hui clans around Quanzhou in Fujian, who identify as Muslim by nationality but do not practice Islam.^[5][6] All these clans needed were only evidence of ancestry from Arab, or Persian, or other Muslim ancestors to be recognized as Hui, and they do not need to practice Islam.^[7] Due to their ancestors Islamic religion, it is taboo to offer pork to ancestors in the Ding clan family. However, the living Ding family members themselves consume pork.^[8][9]

One branch of this Ding (Ting) family descended from Sayyid Ajjal Shams al-Din Omar resides in Taisi Township in Yunlin County, in Taiwan. They trace their descent through him via the Quanzhou Ding family of Fujian. Even as they were pretending to be Han chinese in Fujian, they still practiced Islam when they origianlly came to Taiwan 200 years ago, building a mosque, but eventually became Buddhist or Daoist. The Mosque is now the Ding families Daoist temple.^[10]

The Ding family has branches in Taiwan, the Philippines, and Malaysia among the diaspora Chinese communities there, no longer practicing Islam but still maintaining a Hui identity.

Other variations

• Ting.
• Đinh (Dinh), used in Vietnam

Prominent people

• Ding Feng (Chengyuan), military general for Eastern Wu
• Ding Feng (younger), military general for Eastern Wu
• Ding Junhui, snooker player
• Ding Lei, founder of Netease
• Ding Ling, author
• Ding Yinhao, PhD student at the University of Adelaide
• Ding Liren, chess player
• Ding Wei, go player
• Ding Abraham, waste management technician/ regulator
• Ding Yuan, Three Kingdoms governor
• Ding Zilin, Professor, currently the leader of the political pressure group Tiananmen Mothers.
• Samuel C. C. Ting, Nobel Prize laureates in Physics, 1976.
• KH Ting, bishop

Fictional characters

• Ding Hai, the central character of The Greed of Man, played by Adam Cheng.
• Ding Yau Kin, the main protagonist of Looking Back In Anger, played by Felix Wong.
• Ding Yau Hong, the main antagonist of Looking Back In Anger, played by Deric Wan.

References

1. ^ http://www.yutopian.com/names/02/2ding46.html
2. ^ ^{a b} Kühner, Hans (2001). "The barbarians' writing is like worms, and their speech is like the screeching of owls": Exclusion and acculturation in the early Ming period". Zeitschrift der Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft 151 (2): pp. 407-429. ISSN 0341-0137. ; p. 414
3. ^ Angela Schottenhammer (2008). Angela Schottenhammer. ed. The East Asian Mediterranean: Maritime Crossroads of Culture, Commerce and Human Migration. Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. p. 123. ISBN 3447058099. http://books.google.com/books?id=GSA_AaRdgioC&pg=PA123&dq=ming+empire,+patron+of+islam+in+china+and+southeast+and+west+asia&hl=en&ei=SszhTfraO8fg0QGR-_2HBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=ming%20empire%2C%20patron%20of%20islam%20in%20china%20and%20southeast%20and%20west%20asia&f=false. Retrieved 2010-06-28. 
4. ^ Dillon, Michael (1999). China's Muslim Hui community: migration, settlement and sects. Routledge. p. 22. ISBN 0700710264. http://books.google.com/books?id=hUEswLE4SWUC. 
5. ^ Gladney, Dru C. (2004). Dislocating China: reflections on Muslims, minorities and other subaltern subjects. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. p. 294. ISBN 1850653240. http://books.google.com/books?id=spHi4AtncqkC&pg=PA294&dq=hui+fujian&hl=en&ei=jSyqTMneHIWglAeMnJj7DA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CC0Q6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=hui%20fujian&f=false. 
6. ^ Robert W. Hefner (1998). Market cultures: society and morality in the new Asian capitalisms. Westview Press. p. 113. ISBN 0813333601. http://books.google.com/books?id=hpXBM6QWaekC&pg=PA113&dq=hui+fujian&hl=en&ei=jSyqTMneHIWglAeMnJj7DA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6&ved=0CD8Q6AEwBQ#v=onepage&q=hui%20fujian&f=false. Retrieved 2010-06-28. 
7. ^ Dru C. Gladney (1996). Muslim Chinese: ethnic nationalism in the People's Republic. Cambridge Massachusetts: Harvard Univ Asia Center. p. 286. ISBN 0674594975. http://books.google.com/books?id=_hJ9aht6nZQC&pg=PA286&dq=hui+fujian+guo&hl=en&ei=OEuqTLziKIO78gbgudSRDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CDQQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=hui%20fujian%20guo&f=false. Retrieved 2010-06-28. 
8. ^ Dru C. Gladney (1996). Muslim Chinese: ethnic nationalism in the People's Republic. Cambridge Massachusetts: Harvard Univ Asia Center. p. 271. ISBN 0674594975. http://books.google.com/books?id=_hJ9aht6nZQC&pg=PA105&dq=hui+village+fujian&hl=en&ei=Zbu4TPuHNYG8lQeE_sTFDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CD4Q6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=cake%20offering%20day%20pork%20ancestor%20ding&f=false. Retrieved 2010-06-28. 
9. ^ Dru C. Gladney (1996). Muslim Chinese: ethnic nationalism in the People's Republic. Cambridge Massachusetts: Harvard Univ Asia Center. p. 272. ISBN 0674594975. http://books.google.com/books?id=_hJ9aht6nZQC&pg=PA105&dq=hui+village+fujian&hl=en&ei=Zbu4TPuHNYG8lQeE_sTFDQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CD4Q6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=fujian%20village&f=false. Retrieved 2010-06-28. 
10. ^ Loa Iok-Sin / STAFF REPORTER (Sun, Aug 31, 2008). "FEATURE : Taisi Township re-engages its Muslim roots". Taipei Times: p. 4. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2008/08/31/2003421916. Retrieved May 29, 2011.