funniest shit i learned this week:
absolutely obsessed about the way daddy sima fang vs daddy sun jian named their sons + the hypothetical relationships they had.
lets look at Sun Jian: He was born to a peasant father whos name was never even recorded in history, but he had high hopes for his sons and he named them accordingly:
Sun Ce, styled Bofu -- Ce means "strategy," Fu is a type of military token used to prove that a command has legitimate authority. very ironic the son named "strategy" is the hothead who rushes into things.
Sun Quan, styled Zhongmou -- Quan means "right" e.g. "the right to rule", Mou means also strategy. this time it's appropriate, at least!
Sun Yi, styled Shubi -- Yi means "to assist," Bi also means..."assist" I guess daddy was trying to get the message across "hey champ. ur like the 3rd son ur NEVER going to inherit. so just be good and help ur bros, ok?"
Sun Kuang, styled Jizuo--Kuang means "to revive" as in "to revive the han dynasty." Zuo............also means "assist." (OK DAD. I GET THE MESSAGE. GOD.)
MOVING ON!
this is the 8 brothers of the sima clan. notice anything?
ALL their courtesy names ended in Da. No it wasn't common for the time. Their contemporaries were straight up roasting them for it, calling them the "Sima-Eight-Da"
it gets better. you see the courtesy names Bo, Zhong, Shu ect? they're used to denote birth order going from eldest-> youngest.
this is the fucking equivalent of naming your kids One Two Three Four Five... + tacking on a Da at the end. (Da means achieve/reach btw)
im losing my fucking mind over the implications. Sun Jian the barely-educated, peasant-born, Mr "talk softly and carry a HUGE sword," is spending 7 hours a day on babynames.com in between kicking dong zhuo's ass, obsessing over each letter like a 13yo creating their first OC, being all "my precious baby boys are destined for greatness and they need the COOLEST names and COURTESY names to match." and sima fang is like [Ctr+ C] [Ctr + P], and in the end it's HIS ugly kid that ends up unifying china.
