Fu
A Chinese surname with several different written forms and meanings, depending on the character used.
The #4,235 most common surname in the United States (2010 Census) — about 1 in every 36,887 Americans shares it.
Etymology
Fu is a romanization that can represent multiple Chinese surnames written with different characters. In Chinese, it may correspond to surnames such as 傅, 伏, 符, 付, or 扶, each with its own separate origin and literal sense. Because the same Latin spelling can map to more than one Chinese name, the surname is best understood as a transcription rather than a single shared etymology.
History
Chinese surnames have been written in many romanization systems, so Fu appears in English-language records for several unrelated family lines. It is especially common in overseas Chinese communities, where local dialect pronunciation and older romanizations can collapse distinct surnames into the same spelling. As a result, modern bearers of Fu may belong to different ancestral lineages even when their surnames look identical in English.
Origin
Regions
Variant spellings
Fun fact
In English-language records, Fu can hide several different Chinese surnames that are unrelated in origin but identical in romanization.