Is it possible to translate a japanese name in Kanji to chinese characters?

[adamnhms]

大家好,

My last name is Japanese, and I know how to write it in Kanji. Is there a way to directly translate it to chinese characters?

[skylee]

I suppose so. They are likely the same.

Unless you want it transliterated into Chinese, which would be highly unusual. For example, 橋本 is presented as 橋本 (same as Kanji but pronounced Qiaoben) in Chinese, not 哈是摩托 (ha shi mo tuo).

[Lu]

In Chinese, people would just pronounce the kanji in your surname with the Chinese pronunciation, as Skylee illustrates. But this does not result in a Chinese surname, your surname would be obviously Japanese (unless you happen to have a surname that exists in both countries, they do exist but they seem to be pretty rare).

[skylee]

Like 林, which is Hayashi in Japanese and Lin in Mandarin.

[Lu]

Or 史, which is Shi in Mandarin and apparently also exists in Japan although I don't remember how it's pronounced.

[Glenn]

Also 呉, Which is apparently shared among China (Wu2), Korea (O), and Japan (Kure or Go).

[skylee]

I am in a museum in Kyoto, and have just come across some Japanese surnames (of artists) on the captions that exist in both Chinese and Japanese. 原 is Hara in Japanese and Yuan in Chinese. And 南 is Minami in Japanese and Nan in Chinese.

[skylee]

Today I came across another surname that exists in both Chinese and Japanese. I saw some photographs by 梅佳代 (Ume Kayo) at the Mori Art Museum in Tokyo. 梅 is also a Chinese surname, pronounced "Mei".