Zheng jiapu

[laohuaqiao]

Mar 28, 2014 10:16:06 GMT -5 dragonchef said:

Is there a reason why the first generation doesn’t follow the same format as generations 2-23? Generational poem shows 一朝 while page 3 shows 一世昇字朝奉. Other generations all follow this format : 二國 (from generational poem) and page 3 shows 二世國誠.
Thanks.

On this page the name orders are birth name ming 名, zi 字 and hao 號. The 2nd and 3rd generation ancestors did not have their birth name ming, so their zi were listed first.

To complicate things, I am not even sure 朝 and 國, or a few more of the generation characters should be in the generation poem. Usually, the first few generation ancestors, when they settled in a new region, keep their generation characters from their place of origin, in this case somewhere in Fujian province Putian. It's only after a few generations, the clan has grown to a large number that they decide to either keep the original generation poem or start with a new one.

Anyway, the original 31 character poem doesn't make much sense to me. Generally, poetry lines are of 4, 5 or 7 characters, so 31-character poem is, to pardon the pun, rather odd. In comparison, the last 2 5-character lines added do make sense.

All of these questions can easily be cleared up by finding your ancestral clan village, in Jieyang 揭阳, speaking to the village folks or locating a recent copy of the clan jiapu or zupu.

You should think more clearly what do you want to do with the info, how much facts do you want dig out from your family history?

[dragonchef]

All of these questions can easily be cleared up by finding your ancestral clan village, in Jieyang 揭阳, speaking to the village folks or locating a recent copy of the clan jiapu or zupu.



You should think more clearly what do you want to do with the info, how much facts do you want dig out from your family history?

My initial goal when I received the jiapu was simply to have it translated, dig out all the facts. Now, having spent a little bit of time with it, I realize how difficult and potentially unreasonable that is given my resources and knowledge.
It seems to me that the longer this document sits untouched, the further we will be removed from ever understanding who our ancestors were and where they came from. 

I am currently reaching out to other family members who may have knowledge of current jiapu/zupu and ancestral clan village. Who knows maybe there is a trip in the future.


I am very appreciative of all the information you have given me. It has been invaluable.

[philiptancl]

Dragonchef,

What you have as your Jiapu is the eighth I have seen and worked on that is copied and each of them has varying degree of details. In some of these cases such painstaking copying could had arisen following the social-political movement from 1966 to 1976 in China aimed to get rid of the Four Olds: Old Customs, Old Culture, Old Habits and Old Ideas; keeping of family records among them. Any materials that were deemed to reflect the characteristics of the Four Olds were destroyed. During that period huge amount of Jiapu/Zupu were destroyed. Some entrusted with the upkeep them could have buried them or smuggled overseas for safe keeping. An example of buried Jiapu is shown below:



I have done one for Zhang (張) where the copied version was with just the bare minimum done on a sheet of A3 paper so that it could be easy to be taken out from the home base. This just consists essentially of names of direct ancestors without the names/clan names of spouses. See below:



Then there is your Zheng (鄭) Jiapu where information regarding children, date and time of births and death of earlier ancestors were not copied. A page of it as shown below:



I just complete doing the pedigree chart for one whose pedigree line taken from his Jiapu that was copied by his father so that he, his cousin and future descendants could still know their history and their ancestors. The source which his father had copied was from a larger zupu/jiapu that originally was kept in Ning Yeung Wui Kuan (寧陽會館) in Singapore; an assembly hall and ancestral temple for the Cantonese immigrants from Taishan (台山). See a copied page from it is shown below:



I have my own Chen/Tan (陳) branch that was copied by an uncle whose great grandfather is also my great-great grandfather. He secretly copied it at great risk to himself with material mainly from our ancestral village during that time of the social-political movement for the benefit for his descendants. It contained greater details as could be seen below. Some 5 years ago I travelled some 3 hours to meet up him so as to get a copy from him. He was a disappointed man for the effort he had taken because none of his children has any interest on their roots and ancestry. In Chinese, the term he used to describe their attitude was that they had become “barbarians”. My branch of zupu was recompiled and updated in 2003 based on whatever materials available at that time. In it the brothers for some generations before that for my grandfather were missing. Based upon what my uncle had copied, the missing names have now been included into my branch and these had been subsequently added into chart provided in my my ancestral place website maintained by the webmaster based in Hong Kong. A page written by my uncle is shown below:



Then there was pedigree chart I had done for a fellow genealogy friend whose is from the Fengshan Chen/Tan Clan (豐山陳氏). The zupu that was copied in its entirety from an old version last updated in 1637. I understand the clan is considering an update now. A copy of a page from the copied version is shown below. The friend was originally from Malaysia but is now working in San Francisco. His ancestral village in Yongchun, Fujian is about 10 miles away from mine. Last year I just discovered my 3rd granduncle was adopted into that clan.



Based upon what have been provided as the generation names for many different clans within a surname and those contained in other surname clans, I seem to have the impression that generation names need not necessarily be in the form of a poem. This is going through the reference book for surnames for Yongchun (永春) County which contained about 90 different surnames and some surnames have 30 or more different clans within a surname. These are the conclusion I could draw:
1. Not all clans would have generation names.
2. Some clans have two sets of generation names; one for Hui (諱) and one for Zi (字). Looking at the reference book for surnames for Anxi (安溪) County some clans having two sets of generation names have one set for Ming (名) which the other for Zi (字).
3. Not all generation names are listed in the form of a poem.

As to whether people within generations were using the generations, the following are some of my observations:
1. Generation names, when written, need not necessary done at the time of the progenitor. It may be coined some generations later. Therefore the names for earlier generations would not be following generation names.
2. Following the generations names seem to be more closely adhered to in the generations following the time the generation names were coined.
3. Some clans within some surname tend to keep to one set of generation names while others tend to change them when one move to a different place.

I can see Dragonchef is picking up things very fast in his discovery about Chinese genealogy. Even if you get your pedigree chart done, I would suggest you do not get the chart printed as scroll yet. You should wait for more research be done so that more materials can be included to make it more worthwhile.

Philip

[laohuaqiao]

dragonchef,
Here's a bit more info from the jiapu which may help you decide where/how to go on:

Yuanding's great grandfather (1816-1876) was a government official, he took on a government official name (name, not official position title), guanming 官名, Shucai 树材. He had 2 wives and 8 sons, sons #1 -4 by first wife and sons #5-8 by second wife.

The jiapu didn't record anything info on sons #1-4, only recorded #5-8.
Yuanding's grandfather (1860 - 1944) was son #6. He had 5 sons and 3 daughters.
Son #5 died at age of 16 and was buried in Beijing Xuanwumen Wai 宣武门外, presumably Yuanding's great grandfather was a government official with the Qing Dynasty serving in Beijing at that time.
Son#7 (1863 - 1902) had 5 sons and 2 daughters.
Son #8 died at the age of 16.

Yuanding's father (1884 - 1913) was the eldest of 5 sons. He had 4 sons, Yuanding, Yuansen and Yuanxun. He was buried in Suzhou Huqiu 苏州 虎丘 Xichang Lane 席場弄. Suzhou Huqiu is a well known landmark and that Xichang Lane still exists.
Yuanding's 2nd uncle (1886 -1894) buried at South Station inside Chaozhou Association (city ?)
Yuanding's 3rd uncle (1889 -1890) buried at South Station inside Chaozhou Association
Yuanding's 4th uncle (1891 -1892) buried at South Station inside Chaozhou Association
Yuanding's 5th uncle (1898 - ?)

From these info, it is possible that from the time Yuanding's great grandfather became an official in Beijing in the early to mid 1800s, the family never returned to live in Jieyang again.

[laohuaqiao]

dragonchef,

I'm making some progress. You belong to the Jinpu lineage of the Zheng Clan 郑氏金浦系 in Guangdong Shantou Chaoyang 广东 汕头 潮阳, Jinpu being the place where the founding ancestor Zheng Sheng 郑升 settled. Jinpu was once called Shenpu 深浦, the lineage is also known as Shenpu lineage 郑氏深浦系.

I take back what I previously said about the generation poem. Except for a few errors, the poem is correct. The original poem could have been 4 lines of 4 characters (4x4), then 5 lines of 5 characters added, or 3 lines of 5 added and subsequently another 2 lines of 5 added, for a total of 41 characters.

This is the poem, in simplified character (your jiapu was written in traditional characters.)

朝国真云，
道伯子仲，
弘文邦世，
正思淑立。
启奕茂上昌，
端修学可则，
建相名宜兴，
承继迎新命，
敦仁树厚基。

Photos of ancestral temple: tieba.baidu.com/p/2860984853

[laohuaqiao]

Zupu of Jinpu lineage of the Zheng Clan, including genealogy tree for generations 1 to 5

zsjpxzc.com/tsg/zp01/

From page 258 onward, genealogy tree, followed by Jinpu clan population distribution among villages in Chaoyang and throughout Guangdong province and then some photos of tomb of early ancestors.

[dragonchef]

poem that matches what my grandmother had from zsjpxzc.com/grandview_read.asp?id=80

[dragonchef]

screen captures from the zupu for 24,26 and 27th generations.

[philiptancl]

What is progressively revealed in Dragonchef search for his ancestry, I could not resist in putting some information into a chart form in spite that I have yet to complete the tax returns I am currently doing. Below is the partial chart done with whatever Dragonchef had digitized for the names of his ancestors and for which he had forwarded to me. From the zupu that Laohuaqiao had pointed out, it would appear that Dragonchef should now be able to know each generation of his ancestry all the way back to Huang Di. There are quite some images of his ancestors that can be included.

[dragonchef]

2nd generation burial site

[philiptancl]

Dragonchef,

This would be your first chart from Huang Di down to the first Zheng (鄭/郑). AS I had done the major part of this chart before, it is a matter of modifying it to suit your case.




Philip

[dragonchef]

Thanks, Philip! The charts are really looking great!

Are there any resources you can recommend (that are in English) which talks about the generations and surnames that are attributed to Huangdi?

I've found a few Zheng related websites which are great but the Google translations are only slightly clearer to me than the Chinese.

I found a picture of this awesome statue on one of the websites.

[philiptancl]

Dragonchef,

There is a book entitled "The Origin of Chinese Surname" by Chung Yoon-Ngan in English. You can purchase the book from him directly. He is in Australia.

On my side, I had been doing a chart for quite some surnames showing how they are descended from Huang Di but I have not been updating it for quiet sometime. In doing your chart I have just found that the following surnames could now be added as well:
1. Máng (駹)
2. Liáng (良)
3. Rán (然)
4. Hǎn (罕)
5. Yóu (遊)
6. Guó (國)
7. Sì (駟)
8. Fēng (豐)
9. Jiā (嘉)
10. Yìn (印)

I had posted the chart some years ago. When I find the time to update it, I shall post it again. One obstacle I have encountered is regarding the surname Huáng (黃). I have conflicting sources showing different number of generations leading to the first Huang.

Do you know the names of the three depicted on statue you posted?

Philip

[dragonchef]

The image from this site shows the names on the statues www.zhengshi.ha.cn/

Zhèngzhuānggōng 郑庄公 (left)

Zheng Xiang Gong 郑相公 (middle)

Zheng Wugong 郑武公 (right)






I arrived at this website via the "friendship" link from the website that laohuaqiao had posted.

[Doug 周]

Apr 3, 2014 19:54:56 GMT -5 dragonchef said:

...but the Google translations are only slightly clearer to me than the Chinese.

Dragonchef,

I also find that Google Translate for Chinese leaves more to be desired than Google Translate for the Western languages. If the passages are in Classical Chinese, then it is almost impossible with a machine translator. See the brief excerpt from Professor David Moser, University of Michigan in his section 6.

6. Then there's classical Chinese (wenyanwen).
Forget it. Way too difficult. If you think that after three or four years of study you'll be breezing through Confucius and Mencius in the way third-year French students at a comparable level are reading Diderot and Voltaire, you're sadly mistaken. There are some westerners who can comfortably read classical Chinese, but most of them have a lot of gray hair or at least tenure.
...
pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html/