龚 (Gōng): surname Gong

Meanings

1 surname Gong
2 to supply; to provide (original sense, now written 供)

Characters

龚

Gōng

surname Gong

Examples

龚自珍是晚清著名的改良派学者和诗人。

Gōng Zìzhēn shì wǎnQīng zhùmíng de gǎiliáng pài xuézhě hé shīrén.

Gong Zizhen was a leading reformist scholar and poet of the late Qing.

龚贤是清初金陵八家之一。

Gōng Xián shì Qīng chū Jīnlíng bājiā zhīyī.

Gong Xian was one of the Eight Masters of Jinling in early Qing painting.

Tips

culture

龚 is a moderately common Chinese surname, ranked around 100th by population (Hundred Family Surnames). Two famous bearers anchor the name in cultural memory: (1) 龚自珍 (1792-1841), late-Qing reformist scholar whose poem 《己亥杂诗》 contains the famous line 我劝天公重抖擞，不拘一格降人才 ('I urge Heaven to rouse itself again, and send down talent in every form'). (2) 龚贤 (1618-1689), early-Qing landscape painter, one of the Eight Masters of Jinling.

history

Historically, 龚 was an old graph for what is now written 供 (to supply, provide). Once 供 took over the verbal sense, 龚 specialised as the surname character only. This is why the Shuowen Jiezi glosses 龚 as 给 'to give, supply' — its original meaning before semantic differentiation.

Components

radical

龙 lóng

dragon

Top dragon radical (Kangxi #212). The indexing radical of the character, though the dragon is not semantically central — it acts as the phonetic, supplying the sound (lóng → gōng involves a regular initial shift in the same Old Chinese phonetic series). The same phonetic anchors 袭 (attack), 笼 (cage), 聋 (deaf).

phonetic

共 gòng

together; supplying the sound

Bottom 共 — supplies the modern sound (gòng → gōng, tone shift only) and the original semantic of 'supplying, offering with two hands' (the early form pictured two hands presenting an object). This bottom element is the historical core: 龚 originally meant 'to supply', a sense later taken over by 供 (which adds the person radical 亻).