Cao is the Pinyin

Pinyin

Pinyin is the official system to transcribe Chinese characters into the Roman alphabet in China, Malaysia, Singapore and Taiwan. It is also often used to teach Mandarin Chinese and spell Chinese names in foreign publications and used as an input method to enter Chinese characters into...

 romanization

Romanization

In linguistics, romanization or latinization is the representation of a written word or spoken speech with the Roman script, or a system for doing so, where the original word or language uses a different writing system . Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written...

 of several Chinese family names, including 曹 Cáo, 操 Cāo, 草 Cǎo along with other possible rarer characters. Using the Wade-Giles

Wade-Giles

Wade–Giles , sometimes abbreviated Wade, is a romanization system for the Mandarin Chinese language. It developed from a system produced by Thomas Wade during the mid-19th century , and was given completed form with Herbert Giles' Chinese–English dictionary of 1892.Wade–Giles was the most...

 system, Tsao is romanized as Ts'ao, also spelled Tsao.

Among these names, 曹 Cáo is the most common and listed as the 26th surname in the Hundred Family Surnames

Hundred Family Surnames

The Hundred Family Surnames is a classic Chinese text composed of common surnames in ancient China. The book was composed in the early Song Dynasty. It originally contained 411 surnames, but was later expanded to 504. Of these, 444 are single-character surnames, and 60 are double-character surnames...

. The surname 曹 Cáo originated in the Chinese vassal state of Cao

Cao (state)

The State of Cáo was a vassal state in China during the Zhou Dynasty . The state was founded sometime in the 11th century BCE by Caoshu Zhènduó （曹叔振鐸）, son of King Wen of Zhou and the younger brother of King Wu of Zhou. With its capital at Táoqiū , the State of Cáo covered roughly the area of...

, founded by Ji Zhenduo during the Zhou Dynasty

Zhou Dynasty

The Zhou Dynasty was a Chinese dynasty that followed the Shang Dynasty and preceded the Qin Dynasty. Although the Zhou Dynasty lasted longer than any other dynasty in Chinese history, the actual political and military control of China by the Ji family lasted only until 771 BC, a period known as...

. Cao Cao

Cao Cao

Cao Cao was a warlord and the penultimate chancellor of the Eastern Han Dynasty who rose to great power during the dynasty's final years. As one of the central figures of the Three Kingdoms period, he laid the foundations for what was to become the state of Cao Wei and was posthumously titled...

 (曹操) was a warlord and the penultimate Chancellor during the final days of the Eastern Han Dynasty. His son Cao Pi

Cao Pi

Cao Pi , formally known as Emperor Wen of Wei, was the first emperor of the state of Cao Wei during the Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history. Born in Qiao County, Pei Commandery , he was the second son of the late Han Dynasty warlord Cao Cao.Cao Pi, like his father, was a poet...

 subsequently proclaimed himself emperor of Wei

Cao Wei

Cao Wei was one of the states that competed for control of China during the Three Kingdoms period. With the capital at Luoyang, the state was established by Cao Pi in 220, based upon the foundations that his father Cao Cao laid...

. One branch of Cao Cao's descendants adopted his given name 操 Cāo as family name. The Zhu is also a branch of the Cao (曹) family.

曹 Cáo is also found in Korea

Korea

Korea ) is an East Asian geographic region that is currently divided into two separate sovereign states — North Korea and South Korea. Located on the Korean Peninsula, Korea is bordered by the People's Republic of China to the northwest, Russia to the northeast, and is separated from Japan to the...

, with the romanizations of Cho

Cho (Korean name)

Cho or Jo is a Korean family name. As of 2000, there were 1,347,730 people by this surname in South Korea of a total population of 45,985,289: more than 2% of the total population...

or Jo.

Notable person named 曹 Cáo

• Huai-Dong Cao
  Huai-Dong Cao
  Huai-Dong Cao is A. Everett Pitcher Professor of Mathematics at Lehigh University. He collaborated with Xi-Ping Zhu of Zhongshan University in verifying Grigori Perelman's proof of the Poincaré conjecture. The Cao–Zhu team is one of three teams formed for this purpose...
  
  , mathematician
• Cao Cao
  Cao Cao
  Cao Cao was a warlord and the penultimate chancellor of the Eastern Han Dynasty who rose to great power during the dynasty's final years. As one of the central figures of the Three Kingdoms period, he laid the foundations for what was to become the state of Cao Wei and was posthumously titled...
  
  
  • Cao Pi
    Cao Pi
    Cao Pi , formally known as Emperor Wen of Wei, was the first emperor of the state of Cao Wei during the Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history. Born in Qiao County, Pei Commandery , he was the second son of the late Han Dynasty warlord Cao Cao.Cao Pi, like his father, was a poet...
    
    
  • Cao Zhi
    Cao Zhi
    Cao Zhi was a poet who lived during the late Han Dynasty and Three Kingdoms period of Chinese history. His poetry style, greatly revered during the Jin Dynasty and Southern and Northern Dynasties, came to be known as the Jian'an style....
    
    
• Cao Gui
• Cao Shen
• Cao Xueqin
  Cao Xueqin
  Cao Xueqin was a Qing Dynasty Chinese writer, best known as the author of Dream of the Red Chamber, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature...
  
  

See Sovereigns of Cao Wei

• Cao Guojiu
• Cao Xueqin
  Cao Xueqin
  Cao Xueqin was a Qing Dynasty Chinese writer, best known as the author of Dream of the Red Chamber, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature...
  
  
• Cao Kun
  Cao Kun
  |-...
  
  
• Cao Yu
  Cao Yu
  Cao Yu , born as Wan Jiabao , was a renowned Chinese playwright, often regarded as China's most important of the 20th century. His most well-known works are Thunderstorm , Sunrise and Peking Man...
  
  
• Cao Gangchuan
  Cao Gangchuan
  Cao Gangchuan was vice chairman of Central Military Commission and former Minister of National Defense of the People's Republic of China. He was also state councilor and director of the PLA General Armament Department.-Biography:...