Honorifics

So my mom has/had seven older siblings (not including the ones who died during infancy), more or less--the eldest died recently.

Anyway, the practice is that if you're younger than someone, you just call them by their titles, not their names--which is a bit of a relief for me, since I can barely remember my own Chinese name. Whereas if you're the older person in the interaction, you typically address the younger by name.

But is it as simple as "Aunt" and Uncle"? Oh, no--you have to differentiate by birth order and marriage as well.

So, my mom's older sister is "San1 Yi2 Ma1"--third aunt--and her husband is "San1 Yi2 Zhang4"--essentially, "third uncle by marriage."

The sister above her is "Er4 Yi2 Ma1"--second aunt--and her husband is "Er4 Yi2 Zhang4."

The eldest (now dead) is "Da4 Yi2 Ma1"--"big" aunt, and so on.

I have created the following chart for your understanding:

Mind, it is boggled.

I think in practice, I'm "allowed" to address my mom's sister, regardless of birth order, "just" yi2 ma1, I think the numbers are for differentiation mostly. But never call her jiu4 ma1, which also means aunt, but specifically the woman who has married my mom's brother.

tl;dr: it's fuckin' complicated, y'all.