According to traditional stories, the surname pronounced Líng (凌) in Mandarin originated during theZhou dynasty as anoccupational surname for a court official responsible for the storage and handling of ice.King Wu of Zhou's brotherKang Shu [zh] had a son who held this post, and Kang Shu's descendants later adopted Líng as their surname.[1]
Ling Cao (凌操, died 203), Eastern Han dynasty military officer serving under the warlords Sun Ce and Sun Quan
Ling Tong (凌統, 189–217), Eastern Han dynasty military officer, son of Ling Cao
Ling Mengchu (凌濛初, 1580–1644), Ming dynasty writer
Ling Shuhua (凌叔华, 1900–1990), Chinese modernist writer
Ling Yun (politician) (凌云, 1917–2018), first Minister of State Security of the People's Republic of China
Gilbert Ling (凌寧, 1919–2019), Chinese-born American biologist
There is also a less-common surname pronounced Lìng (令) in Mandarin. In some cases, it may be a shortened version of the surnameLinghu (令狐).[2] People with this surname include:
"Ling" may also be anEastern Min,Northern Min, orWu transcription of the surname pronounced in Mandarin asLín (林).[3] People with this surname spelled as "Ling" include:
Ling How Doong (林孝谆, 1934–2021), Singaporean politician and lawyer
Pam Ling (born 1968), American reality show actress of Chinese descent
The Vietnamese surnameLinh originated from the Vietnamese pronunciation of a different character pronounced Líng in Mandarin (靈), which is not used as a surname in Chinese.[citation needed]
The English surname Ling, also spelled Linge, may have two different origins: one from a word used inLincolnshire meaning "heath", and the other as atoponymic surname referring to the parish ofLyng, Somerset.[5]Lings is a variant of the English surname Ling, with addition of anepenthetics.[6]
This page lists people with thesurnameLing. If aninternal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change thatlink by adding the person'sgiven name(s) to the link.
