Pseudonyms, orthonyms and hyponyms
The hyponym of Cheow Ah Yok 趙煜榮 and Loke Yew 陸如佑
In 1860, Zhào Yùróng 趙煜榮 (b. 1843?, b. 2 November 1892) and his elder brother Zhào Yùxīng 趙煜興 (d. May 1891) managed to, after many weeks of sea travel, land themselves in Melaka. The Xinning 新寧 brothers were among the many thousands of sinkhehs 新客 who decided to venture into the unfamiliar world of Nanyang, as their homeland was ravaged by Opium Wars.
The 17-year-old never imagined that he would eventually become the first Chinese magistrate in Kuala Lumpur 華人之長 when the executive power and judicial power of the Captain China were separated into two roles in 1885.
. . . the appointment of a successor is now a subject of some speculation in Selangor, and the choice apparently lies between Yeap Kwan Seng and Ah Yeok. The decision rests with the Government, but, in a matter of this sort, consideration will no doubt be given to Chinese popular feeling.
Of the two men named, a very large section of the Chinese population favor Yeap Kwan Seng, who, since the death of the last Capitan, has had a great deal to do in the administration of his affairs, while in matters involving private settlement, his advice has been invariably sought. He is a strong representative of the Kehs and Hye Lo Hongs, who largely predominate in the State, and it is generally supposed that he is a Keh, or a naturalized Keh, himself. Be that as it may, however, he is regarded as a leading member of the Chinese community, about the largest tin-miner in the State, and a man who has of late years taken a prominent position in public matters.
Ah Yeok, again, is a Macao, which class forms an inconsiderable section of the local population. He also has considerable popularity in his own class, and is looked upon as a man of light and leading. Of the two, he has less influence among his country-men than Yeap Kwan Seng . . .reportedly wanted to install Cheow Ah Yok 趙煜榮 (d. 1892) as the new Captain China but unfortunately he was not of Huizhou 惠州 stock (he was of Xinning 新寧 origin). The next best option was therefore Yap Shak 葉石 (d. 1889). In the proclaimation dated 21 June 1885 (乙酉年五月初十), Yap Ah Shak was pronounced as the new Captain China (
In most of the English documents, Zhào's given name (Róng 榮) was dropped and his name was truncated to Ch￭w Y￭k or Ch￭w Ah Y￭k. In other words, the consonant-structure of his name was locked but you can breathe in the vowels of your choice to complete the squares.
Chinese names are understandably difficult for Europeans to handle phonetically. Zhào, like other Chinese in the Protected Native States, was aware of the problem and he followed the English's way of rendering this name. In fact, he opted orthographically to carve the name ‘cheow・ah・yok' in his personal seal.
| Spelling | Source | Remarks |
|---|---|---|
(◆, ◆, ◆) | Tombstone | All features (surname 趙, generation name or middle name 煜, given name 榮) are preserved correctly. |
| Chow Yuk Wing (◆, ◆, ◆) | We were told that the death of his elder brother (named Chow Ah Heng 趙煜興?, d. May 1891) predated his own death by 18 months. Cheow Yoke's estimated year of birth (1843?) is likely reconstructed based on the data given in the source (e.g. 32 years ago, the 17-year-old followed his elder brother, first to Melaka, then to Sungai Puteh, Ampang). It is important to note that children count mentioned in the paper was: son (0), daughter (1), which was different from the statistics in his tombstone: son (2), daughter (5). The additional names were probably added to the epitaph when the tomb of Cheow was renovated in 1921 中華民國十年歲次辛酉三月.Anon (1892), Selangor Journal 1(18), p. 72 | All features (surname 趙, generation name 煜 or middle name 榮, given name) are preserved phonetically. Romanization was done according to the phonems in Cantonese dialect: 趙 was rendered as ‘Chow', 煜 was rendered as ‘Yuk', 榮 was rendered as ‘Wing'. |
| Ah Yeok (◇, ∅, ◆, ◇) | Anon (1892), Selangor Journal 1(18), p. 72 | Only the middle name (煜 Yeok) is kept, and it was prefixed with a filler word ah. |
| Chow Ah Yeok (◆, ∅, ◆, ◇) | Anon (1892), Selangor Journal 1(51), p. 51 | A filler word ah was injected between the surname 趙 (Chow) and the middle name 煜 (Yeok). The given name 榮 was omitted. |
| Cheow Ah Yeok (◆, ∅, ◆, ◇) | Anon (1896), Selangor Journal 5(30), p. 50 | A filler word ah was injected between the surname 趙 (Cheow) and the middle name 煜 (Yeok). The given name 榮 was omitted. |
| Cheow Ah (◆, ∅, ◆, ◇) | Personal seal | The name is rendered as ‘cheowahyok', without any whitespace between the three phonems. A filler word ah was injected between the surname 趙 (Cheow) and the middle name 煜 (Yok). The given name 榮 was omitted.  |
| Chow Yok (◆, ◆, ◇) | ANM 1957/00025112W | The name was truncated and only the surname 趙 (Chow) and the middle name 煜 (Yok) were kept. The given name 榮 was omitted. |
| Chow Ah Yok (◆, ∅, ◆, ◇) | J. M. Gullick (1955) | A filler word ah was injected between the surname 趙 (Chow) and the middle name 煜 (Yok). The given name 榮 was omitted. |
| Chiew Yoke (◆, ◆, ◇) | Road sign | The surname 趙 was rendered as ‘Chiew' and the middle name 煜 is spelt as ‘Yoke'.
 |
| Chew Yoke (◆, ◆, ◇) | Road sign | The surname 趙 was rendered as ‘Chew' and the middle name 煜 is spelt as ‘Yoke'.
 |
It is reasonable to assume that Cheow was always known to the 19th-century Chinese community as Zhào Yùróng (趙煜榮), since there is no reason to drop any part of a person's full name without justification. It is unclear who started omitting the given name (Róng 榮), we would like to therefore offer two explanations:
- The person who did the name truncation was influenced by the romanized version in English documents.
- The person who did the name truncation was Cheow Ah Yok himself.
If scenario (1) is correct, then the use of the shortened version of the name in Chinese glyphs is rather inappropriate and mildly disrespectful to the man who died only 132 years ago, and the errors committed by the uninitiated many years ago should not be proprogated by any informed mind.
Curiously, we are able to locate at least one purported sample of Cheow Ah Yok's signature in a National Archive document titled ‘Members of the visiting justices' and we can use the document to add some probablistic weight to Scenario (2). In the document, Cheow Yok simply omitted the last digit of his orthonym and signed his name as Zhào Yù 趙煜. He did so probably out of personal preference.
However, for all formal purposes and communications, the Chinese orthonym of the magistrate should always invoked and it should rightfully be printed in full as Zhào Yùróng 趙煜榮, just like how it was done in the Chinese translation of the proclaimation made by J. P. Rodger in 21 June 1885.
Actually, we detected a rather similar situation when we change the subject to Loke Yew 陸如佑 (b. 9 October 1845, d. 24 February 1917), a contemporary of Cheow who outlived him by 20 years. However, in Loke Yew's case, it is his middle name (Rú 如) that has been dropped.
Despite his illustrious role as the man who succeeded Yap Ah Loy 葉德来 as the fourth Captain China 甲政, we are unable to locate the exact date of death of Yap Ah Shak.
The next best thing we can do is to provide a date bracket (with a calendrical width of 49 days). The date is likely between 5 June 1889 (when Yap Ah Shak and Yap Kwan Seng were mentioned together in the Pudu-Petaling road widening project) and 23 July 1889 (when a petition was submitted to support Yap Hon Chin 葉韓進 to take over the seat left by Yap Ah Shak).last Captain China, d. 17 January 1902 光緒二十七年十二月初八) is Sin Chew Jit Poh, 21 September 1969, rendered Hiu Siu and Liu Ngim Kong's name as 邱秀 and 劉彥淦. And the author spelt Yap Kwan Seng's name as 葉觀勝.not to be confused with Yè Guānshèng 葉觀勝 (still alive in 1915, of Sin Chew Kee 新就記 in
Shin On, Yap Ah Loy, Yap Ah Shak and their Chinese names
| Author | Reference | Orthography |
|---|---|---|
| Chin (1874) | Chin Ah Yam's signature (30 January 1874) | 1a陳聖炎 |
| Chang (1874) | Chang Ah Quee's signature (30 January 1874) | 1a鄭景貴 |
| Swenttenham (1875) | Reference to Yap Ah Loy in Swenttenham's diary (30 March 1875) | 1bAlowi |
| Chong et al. (1881) | Reference to Chin Ah Chan as guarantor  | 1a陳泉生 |
| Chin (1882) | Loan application letter (for 2,000 dollars)  | 1a陳泉生 |
| Yap (< 1885) | Yap Ah Loy's seal  | 1a葉德來 |
| Yap (1883) | Yap Ah Loy's signature  | 1a葉德來 |
| Yap (1883) | Yap Ah Shak's signature  | 1葉石 |
| Anon (1885?) | Yè Liánbiāo's tombstone | Wang (1958), Ma (1977) and Lee (1997) incorrectly named Yap Ah Loy's father as Yè Liánkāi 葉聯開, instead of Yè Liánbiāo 葉聯標. More recently, Liew (2023), recorded Yap Ah Loy's father's name as Yè Liánshēng 葉聯升 (Yap Luan Hoi, p. 258), which is again, inconsistent with known epigraphic data. Given the fact that shēng 升 is conspicuously similar to kāi 開 (开), we have reasons to believe that this typo was sourced from Wang (1958).2葉聯標 (Yap's father's name) 2葉茂蘭 (the son of Yè Liánbiāo) |
| Yìnghé Gōngsī (1885) | Petition submitted by Ka Yin Chew tribe to support Yap Ah Shak as the next Captain China  | 2葉茂蘭 2葉致英 |
| Anon (1885) | Proclaimation of Yap Ah Shak and Cheow Ah Yok as the new Captain China and the new Chinese magistrate, respectively.
     | 1a葉德來 1Note that the glyph of shí (石) rendered for Yap Ah Shak's name is not the conventional glyph for stone, for it has an extra dot on the right.  2趙煜榮 |
| Anon (?) | This plaque was described by Chin Soong Kead 陳嵩傑 (2003) A History of Negeri Sembilan Chinese 森美蘭州華人史話, p. 161. The names inscribed on the plaque are: (a) Sheng Daan 盛大安 (b) Qiu Guoan 丘國安 (c) Wu Zhangbo 吳長伯 (d) Deng Youbo 鄧佑伯 (e) Huang Sanbo 黃三伯. The plaque is housed in the Fui Chew Association of Negeri Sembilan 森美蘭州惠州會館. Note that the names of Yap Ah Shak and Yap Ah Loy are not found on the plaque. This indicates that the purported actitivites of two prominent Yap in Lukut were probably apocryphal.Commemorative plaque bearing multiple Huizhou chinese names | 1盛大安 |
| So Ah Chiang was the Huizhou tribe leader in Kelian Baharu. He was the second Huizhou tribe leader to be deified after Shin On. So's story was similar to that of Shin: He tried to flee to a safer place (Penang) but the vessel he was in was ordered to u-turn to Matang (Ngah Ibrahim's base). Like Captain Shin, So was later decapitated. Initially the Huizhou tribesmen had a small altar at Telok Kertang for their deceased leader, but the altar was later upgrade to a small temple (太平馬登蘇藍卓廟).So (1864) | So Ah Chiang's signature  | 1蘇正祥 |
| Anon (1869) | Shin On's tombstone | 2盛明利 (posthumuous name 諱) |
| Anon (1885, 1919/20) | Yap Ah Loy's tombstone | 2葉茂蘭 (posthumuous name 諱) 3葉桂軒 (title 號) 4剛直惠義 (posthumuous title 謚) |
| Yap et al. (1888) | Signatures of Yap Ah Shak and Cheow Ah Yok
  | 2趙煜 1葉石 |
| Anon (1889, 1962) | Yap Ah Shak's tombstone | 2葉致英 (posthumuous name 諱) 3葉伯雄 (title 號) |
| Cheow (< 1892) | Cheow Ah Yok's seal | 2趙煜榮 (post-matriculation name 字) |
| Anon (1892, 1921) | Cheow Ah Yok's tombstone | 2趙煜榮 (post-matriculation name 字) 2趙雄昌 (posthumuous name 諱) 3趙燦庭 (title 號) |
| Charles Hector Letessier (4 June 1852 - 13 October 1921) was a priest at the Church of St. John the Evangelist, the only Catholic church in Selangor back in 1883.Letessier (1893) | Si Sen Ta: A Chinese Apotheosis 四師爺：盛大安之仙格 | 1Shin On 盛大安 was the Captain China of Sungai Ujong during the reign of Yamtuan Radin bin Raja Lenggang (r. 1824 - September 1861). Dato' Kelana Putra Sendeng (r. 1850 - 1872) was the king-maker in 1861 when he vetoed against Tengku Antah bin Yamtuan Radin and Raja Alang Sohor and proceeded to install Yamtuan Imam (r. 1861 - 1869) as the new ruler. Tengku Antah (r. 1869 - 22 October 1888) was eventually installed as the sixth Yamtuan in 1869. In a petition submitted by a group of Melaka tin merchants to Governor Cavenagh in August 1860, we were told that the political stability of the tin settlements in Sungai Ujong was disturbed because Dato' Bandar Tunggal (r. 1849 - 1874) was detained 6 months ago (February 1860?) by the British because he was implicated in a civil case. Dato' Kelana Putra Sendeng took advantage of the power vacuum swiftly, but his decision to levy higher tin taxes was not welcomed by the Chinese tin miners and likely to have revolted against the rule of Dato' Kelana. The exact words written in the petition were: . . . of course causing great discontent and privation amongst the very numerous Chinese there working, which discontent evinced itself in a refusal to agree to an additional tax or impost laid on them by the Chiefs of Rembau and the Dato' Kelana, who, to enforce the same, menaced the Chinese Headmen, and burnt all the bangsals or huts belonging to the Miners, and when the latter resisted, they were attacked and many (upwards of two hundred in number) were killed, and their effects confiscated . . . Yen (1962) reported that the disturbances in Lukut started on 28 August 1860 (咸豐10年7月12日). Zhang (1959) reported that Shin On (b. 12 November 1823, 道光3年10月10日) was decapitated on 12 August 1861 咸豐11年7月7日, when he was only 39.Shin On |
| W. C. Kemp was a magistrate in Kuala Lumpur.Kemp (< 1893) | Yè Lái: The This is the story of Yap Ah Loy recounted in the form of seven-character multi-line regulated verses, likely commissioned by factions hostile to Yap's administration. Note that the word zhēnshí 真實 (real) was dosed into the title to ensure that readers would take the document seriously. The poem was later edited and sanitized to form: The new romance of Yè Lái 新演義葉來傳. Unfortunately, no extant copies of the originals (of either document) remain today. An English translation of the first document, made by W. C. Kemp, however, can be found in Selangor Journal, Vol. 1, p. 184 (February 1893). Note that the poem was titled Yè Lái 葉來 instead of Yè Délái 葉德來. It is not known why the middle name (Dé 德) was removed, so we offer two possibilities: (a) It is likely the middle name was deliberately removed to avoid any potential legal repercussions (b) The middle name of Yap was removed so that the lines in the poem stay consistently seven characters. This unfortunate orthographic truncation probably influenced later writings on Yap Ah Loy, e.g. Xu and Gao (1928).real story 葉來真實演義 | 1c葉來 |
| Kemp (< 1893) | The new romance of Yè Lái 新演義葉來傳 | 1c葉來 |
| Xu Yujiao 徐雨郊 and Gao Mengyun 高夢雲Xu et al. (1928) | Yap Hon Chin's résumé | 1c葉來 (pre-matriculation name 名) 2葉茂蘭 (post-matriculation name 字) |
| S. M. Middlebrook and J. M. Gullick (1951) Yap Ah Loy (1837 - 1885), Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 24(2), pp. 1 - 127. Stanley Musgrave Middlebrook (1898 - 1944) started his research on Yap Ah Loy in the mid-1930s. Middlebrook was certainly aware of W. C. Kemp's translation of The new romance of Yè Lái 新演義葉來傳 and Yè Lái: The real story 葉來真實演義, but we are not sure if they were consulted by Middlebrook when he was preparing the biography of Yap. Middlebrook's papers (confiscated by Japanese military police | Yap Ah Loy's biography | 1Yap Ah Loy Capitan Shin |
| ☠Wáng Zhíyuán 王植原 (? - ) was the author of the first full length biography of Yap Ah Loy, probably partly inspired by the full length English biograph produced by S. M. Middlebrook (1951). He visited Yap family multiple times and was received by Yap Ah Loy's second daughter, Yap Kim Lan 葉金蘭 (mothered by Wong 王氏) and Yap Ah Loy's son-in-law, Loong Len Yew 龍連佑 (the husband of Yap Kim Neo 葉金娘, mothered by Kok Kang Keow 郭庚嬌)Wang (1958) | Yap Ah Loy's biography 葉德來傳 | 1a葉德來 (pre-matriculation name 名) 1b葉亜來 (abbreviated form of 1a 簡稱) 1cWang did not explicitly say that Yè Délái 葉德來 was Yap Ah Loy's pre-matriculation name. Throughout the book, he employed the abbreviation Yè Lái 葉來 consistently to refer to Yap Ah Loy, after he introduced his notation in p. 1: . . . 其後五年，葉德來（簡稱葉亞來或葉來，下仿此）接受了吉隆坡當日華人領袖劉壬光的邀請，由雪邦西南部盧骨到吉隆坡 . . . In p. 16, Yè Màolán 葉茂蘭 was mentioned when Wang introduced Yap Ah Loy's family members formally: . . . 葉來的祖父名文福，父名聯開，母范氏，生葉來兄弟茂蘭、茂恭、茂松、茂寬及妹亜滿（行二）等五人，葉來居長 . . . It is unclear why the names of Yap's siblings are not found in the tombstone of Yap's father in Kwong Tong Cemetery. It is likely that Wang was given the list by Yap Ah Loy's second daughter, Yap Kim Lan 葉金蘭 (then aged 84) or the husband of his youngest daughter, Loong Len Yew 龍連佑 (then aged 82) while he was preparing for his book. Note that Wang also did not explicitly say that Yè Màolán 葉茂蘭 was Yap Ah Loy's post-matriculation name.葉來 (abbreviated form of 1a 簡稱) 1d葉德莱 (The glyph lái 莱 (the cǎo radical 艹 was added to the lái 來) is likely a typo introduced by the publisher, and not by Wang himself. This glyph is found twice in the book, both as figure captions, but never in the main text. This typo was seen again in Hsu (1963) but not in Hsu (1977).typo) 2葉茂蘭 (post-matriculation name) 1b葉亜來街 (Jalan Yap Ah Loy) 1葉石 1趙煜 1b陳亜泉 |
| Yen Cheng-Hwang 顏清煌 (1937 - )Yen (1962) | A history of Negeri Sembilan 森美蘭史 | 2盛明利 |
| Hsu Yun-Tsiao 許雲樵 (1905 - 1981). He taught at Nanyang University, Singapore, from 1957 to 1961, and was the teacher of Lee Yip Lim 李業霖. Hsu (1963) | Modern history of Malaya 馬來亞近代史 | 1a葉德來 (name) 1d葉德莱 (typo) 2葉茂蘭 (title 號) 1e葉阿石 |
| Hsu (1977) | A This paper (pp. 507 - 549) was commissioned by the Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall 雪蘭莪中華大會堂 and it was included in a special publication to celebrate the 54th anniversary of the organization 雪蘭莪中華大會堂慶祝五十四週年紀念特刊study of socioeconomic activities of Chinese in Malay Peninsula 中華民族拓殖馬來半島考 | 1a葉德來 1葉石 2盛明利 |
| ☠馬卒Ma (1977) | Yap Ah Loy's pictorial biography 葉亜來畫傳 | 1b葉亜來 (name 名) 1a葉德來 (alternative name 又名) 2葉聯開 (Yap's father's name) |
| Liew Kam Ba 劉崇漢 (1950 - ). Liew graduated from the University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, in 1975.Liew (1988) | Yap Ah Loy: The Captain of Kuala Lumpur 吉隆坡甲必丹葉亜來 | 1b葉亜來 |
| Lee Yip Lim 李業霖 (1935 - 2023) studied history in Nanyang University, Singapore. And he was the first batch to graduate from the University in 1962.Lee (1997) | Yap Ah Loy's biography 吉隆坡開拓者的足跡: 甲必丹葉亜來的一生 | 1b葉亜來 (nickname 小名) 2葉茂蘭 (name 字) 2葉聯開 (Yap's father's name) 2葉文福 (Yap's grandfather's name) |
| Ho Y. Wan 何玉萬. Ho's article can be found in the book (葉亜來相遇吉隆坡) edited by Tang Ah Chai 陳亜才. She is the history head of Dong Jiao Zong school syllabus committee. Ho studied in Taiwan National Cheng Kung University 臺灣成功大學, and was trained in history.Ho (2006) | A brief history of the development of Kuala Lumpur 吉隆坡發展簡史 | 1b葉亜來 |
| Chng Swee Ping 莊似萍. Chng's article can be found in the book (葉亜來相遇吉隆坡) edited by Tang Ah Chai 陳亜才. She was a member of Dong Jiao Zong school syllabus committee (history division). She graduated from National Taiwan Normal University 國立臺灣師範大學.Chng (2006) | A brief résumé of Yap Ah Loy 葉亜來生平簡介 | 1a葉德來 (alternative name 又名) 1b葉亜來 (reference to Yap in the article) 2葉茂蘭 (name 本名) |
| Huang Qiudi 黄秋迪 is an Associate Professor in the School of History and Culture 歷史文化學院, Tianjin Normal University 天津師範大學.Huang (2010) | A Chinese translation of Andaya and Andaya's A History of Malaysia 馬來西亞史 | 1e葉阿來 |
| Liew (2023) | A History of Chinese in Kuala Lumpur (1857 - 1957) 百年建業：吉隆坡华人历史 (1857 - 1957) | 1a葉德來 1b葉亜來 (alternative name 又名) 1c葉來 (name 本名) 2葉聯升 (Yap Ah Loy's father's name) 2葉文福 (Yap's grandfather's name) |
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