Okay so I just got into the untamed (partly your fault thank you can't wait to read your fics about it) and I'm a lil confused about the names? Idk if you can help at all but. Why does Wei Wuxien for example also get called Wei Ying? And why does Lan Wangji also get called Lan Zhan? Is it about hierarchy or respect? I tried looking it but results were confusing. Anyway if you can answer I would greatly appreciate but if not then no worries! Thanks!
H’okay, so. I might not be the best person to explain this as I am a white American gal but here’s my understanding.
Everyone (probably, more on this in a second) has two names: a birth name (Wei Ying, Lan Zhan) and a courtesy name (Wei Wuxian, Lan Wangji). The courtesy name is something they get when they’re older, and it’s a more formal name. Most people will use the courtesy name with each other.
Some of the characters either don’t seem to have one (Wen Qing for example) or we never get one or the other (Nie Huaisang surely has a birth name but we never hear it, Wen Chao surely has a courtesy name but it’s never used, et c).
There are also titles which are bestowed upon people who are super impressive (Lan Wangji = Hanguang-Jun), and people will be called by their station (Sect Leader Jiang, Young Master Wei) and whether or not these are translated (or translated correctly!) can depend on which set of subtitles you’re using, unfortunately. Netflix tends to just substitute in the name instead of what was actually said, Viki translates them, and I’ve seen screenshots of subtitles that have simply put the Chinese term in the subtitle.
Here’s the heirarchy, from most formal to least, using Lan Wangji as an example since he has all these names.
Honorary title (Hanguang-Jun)
Station (Lan-er-gongzi or Second Young Master Lan)
Relationship (for example, if he had a nephew, they would call him Lan-shushu or Uncle Lan) (Lan Wangji calls his older brother ‘xiongzhang’ which is the formal term for an older brother.)
Lan-xiong (this is so hard to translate into English, honestly the best translation is just ‘bro’, in colloquial terms it’s about equivalent to high school guys calling each other by their last names)
Full courtesy name (Lan Wangji)
Courtesy name without the sect name (Wangji - this is what his older brother calls him)
Diminutive (A-Zhan, which nobody actually calls him in the show, but his parents definitely might have, and people older than him could, they just don’t, because of his personality haha)
There’s actually so many layers to the relationships that we can peel back just by looking at what people call each other and it’s fascinating.
Wei Wuxian initially starts calling Lan Wangji by the fairly respectful Lan-er-gege (gege = big brother, so it’s basically acknowledging Lan Wangji’s seniority over him) (but this is also somewhat flirtatious of him because it’s a step below the more formal Lan-er-gongzi which is what almost everyone else calls him), but when Lan Wangji is ignoring him, he drops straight down to Lan Zhan, which is enormously cheeky of him. It’s like if you had just met an older classmate and started calling them a baby name. He’s doing it solely to get a rise out of Lan Wangji (which, of course, works) but then keeps doing it because ~reasons~
(horniness is probs the reason)
To use some other examples in the opening arc (you said you just got into it so I don’t want to accidentally spoil you on anything):
Wei Wuxian and Nie Huaisang immediately call each other Wei-xiong and Nie-xiong so they’re besties within like an hour of meeting each other
Pretty much everyone calls Lan Xichen by his honorary title, Zewu-Jun, because he is known to be Extremely Awesome
It’s interesting to me that Lan Xichen does not call his brother Lan Zhan, but goes with the just slightly more formal Wangji. The entire Lan sect seems to be Like That.
Conversely, Jiang Yanli calls both her brothers by affectionate diminutives (A-Xian for Wei Wuxian and A-Cheng for Jiang Cheng). Wei Wuxian calls Jiang Cheng the informal birth name as well, and Jiang Cheng calls him by his courtesy name (this is because Wei Wuxian is the older of the two - siblings never use the birth name of their older sibling once they have a courtesy name, apparently that’s considered rude. He could call him Wei-shixiong or da-shixiong, which would be Sect Brother Wei or First Sect Brother, but doesn’t. But that’s not weird. Using the full courtesy name is generally pretty neutral.)
One of the reasons Meng Yao stares heart-eyes at Lan Xichen (and a good illustration of Lan Xichen’s character in general) is that Lan Xichen calls him Meng-gongzi (Young Master Meng) which is a level of respect he a) almost definitely does not get anywhere else due to his parentage, and b) is absolutely unnecessary on Lan Xichen’s part - he could call him Meng Yao without being insulting at all, since Meng Yao has no courtesy name. But he goes out of his way to be extremely respectful to Meng Yao because he’s just That Sort of Person.
Okay I have probably rambled long enough about names and naming conventions, haha, I studied this intensely when I started writing fanfic so hopefully I haven’t gotten anything wrong. Let me know if you have any other questions!
