Why are some sovereign daughters called princesses and some sovereign daughters called Gege?

The names of the two are different because the dynasties are different, and the emperor has different regulations on them. The ancient royal family was extremely complicated, and the regulations on appellation were endless. A small mistake can easily lead to a fatal disaster.

The earliest princess was China's ancient name for the queen's daughter. This word originated in the Zhou Dynasty. During the Zhou Dynasty, Zhou Tianzi divided the title into five different grades. If Zhou's daughter marries a vassal, Zhou won't personally preside over the wedding, but let the vassal surnamed Ji marry. This is also the origin of the princess, the princess refers to the duke, the main purpose is to get married. Together, they are called princesses.

Later, the princess was also classified. In the Western Han Dynasty, the emperor's daughter was a county princess, and the king's daughter was called Weng Zhu. In the Eastern Han Dynasty, they were called county princesses. In the Jin Dynasty, most royal daughters were county kings, or princesses for short. Princesses in the Tang Dynasty are generally princesses. So the princess is a grade princess.

In the post-Jin period, both the imperial daughter and the ancestral daughter were called Gege. Since the Qing dynasty, it has not been called princess, but Gege. However, this statement is not very rigorous, because after the establishment of the Qing Dynasty, Huang Taiji immediately called his royal daughter a princess from Zhongyuan School. After the emperor shunzhi entered the customs, different grades of princesses were stipulated, and it was also proposed that all the daughters of Prince Baylor should be called Gege instead of Princess. At that time, Gege could also be other women with high status.

So in general, the title of the monarch's daughter has been changing. In the early days, a monarch was a princess of high rank, usually a prince. Later, in the Qing Dynasty, because of the emperor's regulations, the monarch's daughter could not be called a princess, so there was no longer a monarch. They were all called Gege, and Gege was graded like a princess.