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The name above is English’s “Hugh” could someone translate the bottom part please? enter image description here

Martinlillico
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3 Answers3

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These are the characters for a sound translation of the English name "Hugo" into Cantonese, pronounced "Wugo". Though the characters are shared with Mandarin, they are pronounced differently in Cantonese and Mandarin.

  • 胡 - pronounced Wu4 in Cantonese, Hu2 in Mandarin
  • 哥 - pronounced Go1 in Cantonese, Ge4 in Mandarin

In the comments you note that the seal was made for your uncle in Hong Kong. The main Chinese language spoken in Hong Kong is Cantonese, although many people also have a good understanding of Mandarin, and English too.

The numbers indicate tones, which are important in Chinese languages, but can be safely ignored in sound translations.

There may be a bit of a gentle punning joke here too. Though, as others note, 胡 is primarily a surname, there is a historical usage 胡人, "foreigner", so your uncle's name could technically be translated as "big brother foreigner" or even "big brother barbarian".

Adam Burke
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The characters below are definitely "胡哥"

Two meanings maybe:

  1. brother Hu where Hu stands for a family name

  2. a popular actor called "胡歌" with his name misspelled

according to the English part Hugh,I am gonna take meaning 2 , because that actor's English name is Hugh . The seal maybe a fanmade one but I can't figure out why it uses "哥".

Charles chen
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  • Hugh was my grandad he had it made for him in Hong Kong many years ago I thought it might be his name translated to Chinese under but I was looking it up and it dos t seem like it is – Martinlillico Sep 29 '21 at 09:55
  • He was also called Hughie so do you think that could be why? For the “哥” – Martinlillico Sep 29 '21 at 11:15
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    I think when a Chinese reader, (not familiar with the particular pronunciation of "Hugh"), on seeing "Hugh" would transliterate it as "Hu" - "gh", 胡 - 歌 -- (Hú - gē) – Wayne Cheah Sep 30 '21 at 02:44
  • Real example : there is a restaurant named “胡哥烤肥牛” In Shenzhen city. – Gentle Y Jul 27 '22 at 02:54
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“HU”= It's a last name. “GE”= It's an appellation. For example, my family name is Zhang. If I'm older, you can call me Uncle Zhang. If you're older, call me grandpa Zhang.

user29574
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