Orient Name
› Surnames › 司马
司马 Sima — a rarer surname
80.1 / 100 overall fit
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| Pinyin | Sima |
|---|
| Strokes | 8 |
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| Commonness | outside the top 100 |
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| Type | compound surname |
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| Theme | Ancient lineage |
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Where the surname comes from
A compound surname meaning 'marshal of horses'; Sima Qian wrote the Shiji, China's first great history.
What the character means
One who presides with order
Theme basis：司马 = a hereditary office in ancient China (marshal)
Why it scores this way
Easy to say96
Reads the way it looks for an English speaker — no sounds English doesn't have.
Recognised in China49
Outside the top 100 — distinctive, but some people will ask you to repeat or write it.
Easy to write100
8 strokes — one of the simpler surnames to write and sign.
People who carried this name
- Sima Qian — Han dynasty historian (c.145–86 BC), author of Records of the Grand Historian.
- Sima Guang — Song dynasty historian and politician. Compiled the monumental chronicle Zizhi Tongjian, covering Chinese history from 403 BCE to 959 CE.
- Sima Yi — Cao Wei strategist and statesman during the Three Kingdoms. His political maneuvers paved the way for the Jin dynasty's founding.
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Other surnames with the same feel
中文版