On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, 629–645 A.D. v1.c4.s2.2

v1.c4.s2.2

The surname of the family to which he belonged was Ch'ên (陳) and his personal name was I (禕).¹ But he seems never to have been known in history, literature, or religion, or among his contemporaries by any other name than that written 玄 (or 元) 奘 and read Hsüan (or Yuan)-chuang (or ts'ang). In modern literature the character for Yuan is commonly used in writing the pilgrim's name, and this is said to be due to the character for Hsüan entering into the personal name of the Emperor Kanghsi. But we find Yuan in the pilgrim's name before the reign of Kanghsi and we find Hsüan in it during that reign and since. This interchange of the two characters is very common and is recognized. The personal name of the Chinese envoy Wang who went to India in Yuan-chuang's time is given as Hsüan (and Yuan)-tsê (王玄 or 元策) and the name of another great contemporary of the pilgrim is written Fang Hsüan-ling and Fang Yuan-ling (房玄 or 元齡). The two characters at the T'ang period may have had the same sound, something like Yun, and our pilgrim's name was probably then pronounced Yun-ts'ang.² This was his hui (諱) or "appellation", called in the Life also his tzŭ (字). This word hui is often used to denote the Fa-hao or "name in religion" of a Buddhist monk, and it is sometimes replaced by tu(度)-hui or "ordination name". It commonly means simply "the name of the deceased" that is, the name given to him when capped, and I do not know of any authority for Julien's rendering "nom d'enfance".