The Study on Mandarin in Late-Qing Dynasty Recorded by Russian Sinologists--A Phonology research according to “Chinese-Russian Dictionary” (1888)

• Main Authors: Chao, Yu Shen, 趙育伸
• Other Authors: Chang, Hsun Huei
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/p2549q

碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 中國文學系 === 103 === 　　One of the most outstanding achievements of Russian Sinology during 19th century was “Chinese-Russian Dictionary” published in 1888. It was compiled by P. I. Kafarov and finished by P. S. Popov. A large number of Chinese characters, words and phrases were collected in this Dictionary, and Russian alphabets were supplementary to each written character for showing Chinese pronunciation. It is the Russian-Chinese transliteration that becomes our basic corpus. 　 　　In the Dictionary, the principle of listing order was by sequence of Russian alphabets, and principle of grouping was by Chinese finals (rhyme). In a group, every character had the same Russian transliteration. However, there was no marker of tone, which is important to distinguish meanings in Chinese language. To solve the problem, the editor or author indistinctly arranged the characters as Yin-ping (陰平 “dark level”), Shang (上 “rising”), Qu (去 “departing”) and Yang-ping (陽平 “light level”) four kinds of tones. After revising the Russian-Chinese transliteration to phonology form, phonetics analysis is possible. We would like to show the language recorded by this Dictionary, and summarize the feature of this language by comparing with different phonetic documents. 　 1. Phonetic analysis on the Dictionary. 　 　　Considering time, space and phonology feature of the Dictionary, we could claim that the language was Mandarin of late-Qing Dynasty. Here are the achievements of phonetic analysis. Initial: 20 initials grouping by place of articulation. 　　p　pʰ　m　f　v　　t　tʰ　n　l　　k　kʰ　x　 　　ts　tsʰ　s　　tʂ　tʂʰ　ʂ　ʐ　　ø Final: 35 finals grouping by jie-yin (介音 “medial; head of rhyme”), in order: kai-kou (開口“open mouth”) with no medial marker, qichi (齊齒“even teeth”) with medial marker /j/, hekou (合口“closed mouth”) with medial marker /w/ and cuokou (撮口“round mouth”) with medial marker /jw/. 　　a　aj　aŋ　an　ɨw　ɨ　ɨŋ　ɨn　ə　ɨj　ɚ 　　jɨ　jɨŋ　jɨn　jə　jɨw　ja　jaj　jaŋ　jan　jaw 　　wə　wɨ　wa　waj　waŋ　wan　wɨj　wɨŋ　wɨn 　　jwan　jwə　jwɨ　jwɨŋ　jwɨn A few of Chinese phonemes of rhymes like /jwə/ matched two Russian spellings. That was just the matter of listening difference and did not influence the phoneme system. Here are some remarkable features about the combination of initial and final. For example, labial consonants did not combine with “closed mouth” and “round mouth” rhyme, except monophthong of “closed mouth” rhyme; velar consonant did not combine with “even teeth” and “round mouth” rhyme, except monophthong of “even teeth” rhyme. 　 2. Historical comparison. 　 　　The Dictionary is compared with mid-ancient Chinese system and Mandarin document “Zhong-yuan Yin-yun”. Here are some remarkable features. First, total voiced initial consonants became devoiced, aspirate as level tone (平聲), while unaspirate as oblique tone (仄聲). Second, retroflex consonants were from Zhi (知), Zhuang (莊), Zhang (章) series in the mid-ancient Chinese. Third, there was no difference between sharp and rounded sounds (尖團音). Fourth, checked tone (entering tone) and its ending consonant were lost. Fifth, nasal endings were only [-n] and [-ŋ], while mid-ancient ending [-m] was lost. Sixth, rhyme [io] was from entering tone of Dang (宕), Jiang (江) rhyme group. Besides, we take some foreign documents in comparison. Our conclusion is that the structure of syllable and language system did not immensely change in that period. We can see that [io] rhyme became weak. Whether [io] rhyme existed or not did not influence the phoneme system.