Talk:Yixuan, 1st Prince Chun

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[edit] "Prince of the First Rank Chun"

1st Prince Chun doesn't receive many google hits, so there appears no set standard in naming the Prince Chuns. "Prince Chun" often refers to the 2nd Prince Chun. In the interests of following the wikipedia standard style of spelling things out in completion on the first line, we should start with "Prince of the First Rank Chun Xian" since that is his official designation in Chinese. We can add "commonly known in English as the 1st Prince Chun" right afterwards. --Jiang 00:44, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Right. A long answer is needed I guess.

1- There is no such thing as an "official designation" in Chinese. Tradionally, such as in Puyi's autobiography, these princes are known according to their formal titles and posthumous names: 醇賢親王 for the 1st prince Chun, and 醇親王 for the second prince Chun. Recently however, it appears many people in China are not aware of these subtilities, and they often appear as "Yixuan, Prince Chun" (醇親王奕譞) for the 1st prince, and "Zaifeng, Prince Chun" (醇親王載灃) for the 2nd prince. Both Chinese designations (traditional and modern) return as many hit in Google. In the article I chose the traditional designation when I translated in Chinese, because I thought it more in tone with the historical context.

2- Now, for the English version of the name, "1st prince Chun" and "2nd prince Chun" are the names adopted in English and French historical books about China (the two western languages with the most scholars specialized in Chinese history), so I think we should follow that pattern of naming. Maybe there are not much hit in Google, but this is not a criteria. These scholarly works would typically not appear online, and these two princes are not very well known outside of China, so it is no surprise there are no hits on Google. This is also the naming pattern that was used in the translation of Puyi's autobiography. Just check any translation of this book in your local bookstore. You can also check this official Chinese website article: [1]. Last but not least, this naming pattern follows the naming pattern of aristocrats in the Western world, such as 1st duke of Buckingham, 2nd duke of Buckingham, etc., so it will be immediately accessible to people not familiar with Chinese history and culture. "Prince of the first rank Chun Xian" and "Prince of the first rank Chun" is just cumbersome, and completely obscure for people not familiar with China. Also, don't forget Xian is more a title ("the Sage") than actually a name.

3- a- Now to completely finish with this subject: when I created the articles, one choice was to name one "Yixuan, prince Chun" or "Yixuan, 1st prince Chun" and the other "Zaifeng, prince Chun" or "Zaifeng, 2nd prince Chun". This would follow even more the pattern of naming aristocrats on Wikipedia, but there's a problem here... Yixuan and Zaifeng are probably not the birth names ("milk names") of these two princes, but the names given to them later and used with people outside the family (大名). I was unable to find their "milk names". Don't forget they may also have zi (字) and hao (号) (in fact I found yesterday that the 2nd prince Chun had a hao, and I will add that now in the article). So in the end I think it is better to leave just "1st prince Chun" and "2nd prince Chun".

b- Your idea of a "wikipedia standard style of spelling things out in completion on the first line" just can't apply to Chinese historical figures, who had so many different names all along their life. It is better to put in bold in the beginning of the text the name under which they are the most known among scholars and the general public in the west, and then explain the rest of the names more in detail inside the article. This is exactly why the Sun Yat-sen article starts with Sun Yat-sen, the name most familiar in English, instead of starting with Sun Dixiang Deming Wen Rixian Yixian Zaizhi Zhongshan.

Hardouin 17:19, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I removed the Chinese on the first line to avoid implying that 1st Prince Chun is what "醇賢親王" means in chinese. Perhaps we should use a box as is used for Sun Yat-sen and other Chinese people with a bunch of names. --Jiang 03:16, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I reverted the Chinese name of the prince (it is important information for people able to read Chinese), but I added the mention "Chinese title", which should avoid thinking that it is a litteral translation of "1st prince Chun". I "unbolded" Seventh Prince and Pu'an. Courtesy names are not bolded on Wikipedia, and Seventh Prince is really an historical name not well known today, not even in China. It confuses people to bold everything. For the sake of clarity, we should bold only the essential names, that is Yixuan, and 1st prince Chun. Hardouin 11:36, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC)

All names are bolded in articles, per convention to the best of my knowledge. Where does it say we shouldn't do this?

In articles like Sun Yat-sen, we do not put Chinese on the first line. "Chinese title" doesn't make it clear enough. And what about the fact that people are calling him 醇親王奕譞? --Jiang 20:52, 30 Sep 2004 (UTC)

I suggest simply naming this article Yixuan, as this gets the most results on Google, and is the naming convention on Chinese encyclopedias such as the Cihai. --Colipon+(T) 01:04, 20 Dec 2004 (UTC)

That's counter to convention to refer to royals by their personal names. We could try the modern convention Yixuan, Prince Chun (to parallel what we've done for British nobility), but not Yixuan by itself. --Jiang 06:47, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I want to yet again raise the point that the Chinese Cihai uses the naming convention Yixuan and Zaifeng for the two Princes Chun. I believe this is a simplistic naming strategy and names (like mentioned before in discussion) can be further explained in the intro section. We need to understand that many Chinese people have a score of titles and ranks, especially the nobility, therefore an internet encyclopedia should take a simple and time-saving approach. Colipon+(T) 19:56, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Here at the English Wikipedia we use the names that are most common in English, not the names that are most common in Chinese. In Western historical circles, he is known as "the 1st Prince Chun", he is not known as "Yixuan", so we should stick to what's the common name in English. That's why for instance we have an article about "Sun Yat-sen", although Chinese people actually call that historical figure "Sun Zhongshan". Hardouin 13:01, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)