皇太極
It is unclear whether "Hong Taiji" was a title or a personal name. Written "Hong taiji" in Manchu, it was borrowed from the Mongolian title "Khong Tayiji". That Mongolian term was itself derived from the Chinese "huang taizi" 皇太子 ("crown prince", "imperial prince"), but in Mongolian it meant, among other things, something like "respected son". Alternatively, historian Pamela Crossley argues that "Hung Taiji" was a title "of Mongolian inspiration" derived from "hung", a word that appeared in other Mongolian titles at the time. Early seventeenth-century Chinese and Korean sources rendered his name as "Hong Taiji" (). The modern Chinese rendering "Huang Taiji" (), which uses the character "huang" ("imperial"), misleadingly implies that Hong Taiji once held the title of "imperial prince" or heir apparent, even though his father and predecessor Nurhaci never designated a successor.