shǐ 史

The origin of the "Shi" surname: 1. Derived from official titles. According to "The Table of Prime Ministers' Lineages in the Tang Dynasty", the Shi clan descends from the descendants of Yi, the Grand Historian of the Zhou Dynasty. Yi is also written as "Yi" (逸). "Shi" was an official title, and he was also known as "Zuoce Yi" and "Yin Yi". His main duty was to record the words and deeds of the Son of Heaven. Some people regarded Shi Yi, Jiang Taigong, Duke Zhou, and Duke Shao as the "Four Sages". Later, his descendants took "Shi" as their surname. 2. It is one of the "Nine Surnames of Zhaowu" (refer to the "He" surname). The former site of the State of Shi is to the south of Samarkand in present - day Uzbekistan. It was once under the jurisdiction of the Tang Dynasty and submitted to the Central Plains during the Yonghui reign of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty. Later, its people took "Shi" as their surname. 3. The Ashina clan lived on Mount Doumou, which the northern people called the Turkic Grotto. They had been the rulers for ten generations from the Wei and Jin Dynasties. Later, they belonged to the Rouran (also written as 蠕蠕). The Ashina was their leader. At the end of the Later Zhou Dynasty, they exterminated the Rouran and dominated the northern land for about a hundred years. When Chuluo, Sunish, etc. were naturalized, they were called Ashina. During the Kaiyuan reign of the Tang Dynasty, they changed their surname to Shi.