Wanyan was a Heishui Mohe

Heishui Mohe

The Heishui Mohe or Heuksu Malgal also called Black-River Mohe , were the most feared among the Mohe tribes...

 tribe living in the drainage region of the Heilong River during the Khitan

Khitan people

thumb|250px|Khitans [[Eagle hunting|using eagles to hunt]], painted during the Chinese [[Song Dynasty]].The Khitan people , or Khitai, Kitan, or Kidan, were a nomadic Mongolic people, originally located at Mongolia and Manchuria from the 4th century...

 Liao Dynasty

Liao Dynasty

The Liao Dynasty , also known as the Khitan Empire was an empire in East Asia that ruled over the regions of Manchuria, Mongolia, and parts of northern China proper between 9071125...

 time. The Wanyan clan was founded by Hanpu

Hanpu

Hanpu , later Wanyan Hanpu, was a Jurchen leader of the early tenth century. According to the ancestral story of the Wanyan clan, Hanpu came from Goryeo when he was sixty-years old, reformed Jurchen customary law, and then married a sixty-year-old local woman who bore him three children...

, who, according to the "History of the Jin" (Jinshi 金史), came from the kingdom of Goryeo

Goryeo

The Goryeo Dynasty or Koryŏ was a Korean dynasty established in 918 by Emperor Taejo. Korea gets its name from this kingdom which came to be pronounced Korea. It united the Later Three Kingdoms in 936 and ruled most of the Korean peninsula until it was removed by the Joseon dynasty in 1392...

 at the age of sixty. The tribe was part of "uncivilized Jurchen"(生女真), which means that the tribe was not subordinated to the direct ruling of Khitan Emperors. Those Heishui Mohe tribes ruled by Khitan Emperors were called "civilized Jurchen" (熟女真) to indicate that they are more civilized.

In 1115, Wanyan Aguda

Wanyan Aguda

Emperor Taizu of Jin was Emperor of Jin from January 28, 1115 to September 19, 1123.He was the chieftain of the Jurchen Wanyan tribe, founder and first emperor of the Jin Dynasty . He was the younger brother of Wanyan Wuyashu...

, the chieftain of the Wanyan Tribe, founded Jurchen Jin Dynasty. He destroyed Khitan Liao Dynasty before he died in 1123. Two years later, his brother Wanyan Wuqimai invaded Song Dynasty

Song Dynasty

The Song Dynasty was a ruling dynasty in China between 960 and 1279; it succeeded the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period, and was followed by the Yuan Dynasty. It was the first government in world history to issue banknotes or paper money, and the first Chinese government to establish a...

 and conquered northern China. Jurchens

Jurchens

The Jurchens were a Tungusic people who inhabited the region of Manchuria until the 17th century, when they adopted the name Manchu...

 were sinicized afterwards. The surname "Wanyan" is sinicized as "Wang

Wang (surname)

Wang is a Chinese family name and one of the most common surnames in the world. It is ranked 8th in the Hundred Family Surnames, and first in the People's Republic of China's National Citizen ID Information System . Wang is ranked as the most common surname in mainland China, with 92.88 million...

" according to Jurchen's official history records. In 1234, Jurchen Jin Dynasty was destroyed by the alliance of Mongol and Han Chinese

Han Chinese

Han Chinese are an ethnic group native to China and are the largest single ethnic group in the world.Han Chinese constitute about 92% of the population of the People's Republic of China , 98% of the population of the Republic of China , 78% of the population of Singapore, and about 20% of the...

's Southern Song Dynasty. Both Mongol and Han Chinese claimed that people with the surname "Wanyan" will be treated as from the royal line of Jurchen Jin and be executed immediately. Therefore, for the sake of survival, people with the surname "Wanyan" either changed the name to a Han Chinese form or moved to remote area. In present day China, only the villagers in a small town of Jingchuan, Gansu Province keep the surname "Wanyan".