Chén Zǔniàn 陳祖念, zì Xiūfǔ 修甫, was a late-Míng Confucian scholar from Liánjiāng 連江 (Fúzhōu 福州, modern Fújiàn 福建), the son of the famous philologist Chén Dì 陳第 (1541–1617). Chén Dì’s Máoshī gǔ yīn kǎo 毛詩古音考 and Qū Sòng gǔ yīn kǎo 屈宋古音考 were foundational early-modern texts in Chinese historical phonology, but his Fú Xī tú zàn 伏羲圖贊 (a Yìjīng chart-eulogy) was much weaker. The Sìkù editors candidly note that “the son’s learning did not reach the father’s, but his exposition of the Yì surpassed the father’s” — a rare Sìkù judgment of generational reversal.
Chén Zǔniàn’s surviving work in the Sìkù is the Yì yòng 易用 (KR1a0109) in six juàn, an yìlǐ-oriented Yìjīng commentary that draws on the Hàn hùtǐ 互體 method without committing to any one school’s overall framework. CBDB has no entries for him; his lifedates are undocumented.