Names of Sun Yat-sen

Like many Chinese, Sun Yat-sen used different names at different points in his life and he is known in China under several of them. Names are not taken lightly in Chinese culture. This reverence goes as far back as Confucius and his insistence on "rectification of names."

In addition to the names and aliases listed below, Sun Yat-sen also used other aliases while he was a revolutionary in exile.

Genealogical name: Sūn Démíng (孫德明)

The "real" name of Sun Yat-sen, the name inscribed in the genealogical records of his family, is Sūn Démíng (孫德明). This genealogical name" (譜名, pǔ míng) is what extended relatives of the Sun family would have known him by. This is a name that was used in formal occasions. The first Chinese character of the given name, dé (德), is the generation character which he shared with his brother and his relatives on the same generation line. Traditionally, this name was not used in intercourse with people outside of the family, and inside China or Taiwan almost nobody knows that his real name was Sun Deming (although other historical figures such as Mao Zedong are known by their "register name"), and even many Chinese people wrongly assume that Deming was his......
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