Posthumous titles granted to Sinosphere monarchs for ancestral worship
Temple names are posthumous titles accorded to monarchs of the Sinosphere for the purpose of ancestor worship.[1] The practice of honoring monarchs with temple names began during the Shang dynasty in China and had since been adopted by other dynastic regimes in the Sinosphere, with the notable exception of Japan. Temple names should not be confused with era names (年號), regnal names (尊號) or posthumous names (謚號).
Modern academia usually refers to the following rulers by their temple names: Chinese monarchs from the Tang to the Yuan dynasties, Korean rulers of the Goryeo (until AD 1274) and Joseon dynasties, and Vietnamese rulers of the Lý, Trần, and Later Lê dynasties (with the Hồ and Later Trần dynasties as exceptions).
Numerous individuals who did not rule as monarch during their lifetime were posthumously elevated to the position of monarch by their descendants and honored with temple names. For example, Cao Cao was posthumously honored as an emperor and given the temple name Taizu by Cao Pi of the Cao Wei dynasty. Meanwhile, several individuals who were initially assigned temple names had their titles revoked, as was the case for Emperor Huan, whose temple name, Weizong, was abolished by Emperor Xian of the Eastern Han dynasty. In other cases, numerous individuals were honored with more than one temple name by intentional changes or being accorded different titles by different individuals. For instance, the Yongle Emperor of the Ming dynasty was originally honored as Taizong by the Hongxi Emperor, but his temple name was later amended to Chengzu by the Jiajing Emperor. There were also instances of individuals ruling as the sovereign of a particular realm but being accorded a temple name by another realm, as was the case for Möngke of the Mongol Empire, who was later honored as Xianzong by Emperor Shizu of the Yuan dynasty.
- ^ Keightley, David N. (1996). "Art, Ancestors, and the Origins of Writing in China". Representations (56): 68–95. doi:10.2307/2928708. ISSN 0734-6018. JSTOR 2928708.
Once a Shang king died he was awarded a posthumous "temple-name" employing one of the ten "heavenly stems" (tian gan, a later term) that were also used to name the ten days of the Shang week. Thus, we find ancestors being worshipped as Dajia (jia being the name of the first day of the week), Da Yi (yi being the name of the second day of the week), and Wai Bing (bing being the third day of the week).
