沈 is romanised as Sum, Sem, Sam, Sham, or Shum in Cantonese; Sim in Hokkien & Teochew; Shim(심) in Hakka and in Korean; and Thẩm/Trầm in Vietnamese.

A remaining 37% of all 沈's in China inhabit these 7 neighbouring provinces & cities of Shanghai, Anhui, Henan, Guangdong, Hubei, Guizhou and Shandong.

지능의택상，섭재보규용；(ji neung ui taek sang, seop jae bo gyu yong) Ancestor veneration in China (中国传统宗法性宗教) is very common amongst family clans to maintain Chinese kin (宗族).

These people were descended from Shao Hao, whose grandson was Zhuanxu's teacher and fathered Yun Ge and Tai Dai.

Tai Dai was granted Shanxi for his achievements in controlling the flooding of the Yellow River and his descendants divided into four "kingdoms": the Shen, the Yi, the Ru, and the Huang.

Electing not to participate in the northern kingdoms' campaign against Chu in 506 BC, Shen was invaded and destroyed by Cai.

The side-water radical (氵: shuǐ) plus (冘: yín) results in the Chinese character surname (沈: shěn).