Is this a Chinese Name?

[LyYenKhang]

Is 單 a common Chinese name?

[imron]

Not by itself. It is however a surname that is not uncommon (or at least I know of two unrelated people with this surname), but when used as a surname is is pronounced Shàn rather than Dān.

[skylee]

I agree with imron - it is not uncommon.

PS - Similar to Mandarin, when it is a surname, it is pronounced Sin6 in Cantonese (instead of Daan1).

[LyYenKhang]

I'm trying to find how to write someone's name in Chinese. In Vietnamese it is Ðan, but I don't know if it is the dan1 above or this one: 丹

Which one is a more common male name?

[renzhe]

Are you talking about family name, or the given name?

Because there are many characters pronounced dan, and probably many pronounced Ðan in Vietnamese.

[LyYenKhang]

Its a given name. I know there's a lot of characters pronounced dan1 or Dan in Viet but I think its between these two. Its Ðan as in Ðan (單?) viện (院)[meaning a monastery; not sure if I used the right character) or 單(?)士 (Ðan sĩ meaning a monk). I'm not even sure if those word combinations exist in Chinese

[skylee]

monastery? monk? could be 禪 as in 禪院 and 禪師 then.

[LyYenKhang]

The problem with 禪 is that it is pronounced Thiện. The use of "Ðan sĩ" to denote a religious is bit rare so I'm having difficulty finding the character for this usage of "Ðan". It may have been a superficial guess but I thought I saw a connection with 單 (i.e., a religious is celibate). I guess that the usage of "Ðan" in "Ðan sĩ" is 1. the "Ðan" here is a Nom word (I would doubt it though) or 2. its one of the Han-Viet combinations that don't exist in Chinese (like 靈牧)

EDIT:

I've just read that 單 can be read as Dan1 or Chan2 so maybe you are correct. Amazing!