The romanization systems in common use until the late 19th century were based on theNanjing dialect, but Wade–Giles was based on theBeijing dialect and was the system of transcription familiar in the English-speaking world for most of the 20th century. Both of these kinds of transcription were used inpostal romanizations (romanized place-names standardized for postal uses). Inmainland China, Wade–Giles has been mostly replaced byHanyu Pinyin, which was officially adopted in 1958, with exceptions for the romanized forms of some of the most commonly used names of locations and persons, and other proper nouns. The romanized name for most locations, persons and other proper nouns in Taiwan is based on the Wade–Giles derived romanized form, for exampleKaohsiung, theMatsu Islands andChiang Ching-kuo.
Wade–Giles was developed byThomas Francis Wade, a scholar of Chinese and a British ambassador in China who was the first professor of Chinese at theUniversity of Cambridge. Wade publishedYü-yen Tzŭ-erh Chi (語言自邇集;语言自迩集)[2] in 1867, the first textbook on theBeijing dialect ofMandarin in English,[3] which became the basis for the system later known as Wade–Giles. The system, designed to transcribe Chinese terms for Chinese specialists, was further refined in 1892 byHerbert Giles (inA Chinese–English Dictionary), a British diplomat in China, and his sonLionel Giles,[citation needed] a curator at the British Museum.[4]
Taiwan used Wade–Giles for decades as the de facto standard, co-existing with several official romanizations in succession, namely,Gwoyeu Romatzyh (1928),Mandarin Phonetic Symbols II (1986), andTongyong Pinyin (2000). TheKuomintang (KMT) has previously promoted pinyin withMa Ying-jeou's successful presidential bid in 2008 and in a number of cities with Kuomintang mayors.[citation needed] However, theTsai Ing-wen administration andDemocratic Progressive Party (DPP) along with the majority of the people in Taiwan, both native and overseas, use spelling and transcribe their legal names based on the Wade–Giles system, as well as the other aforementioned systems.[citation needed]
The tables below show the Wade–Giles representation of eachChinese sound (in bold type),[5] together with the correspondingIPA phonetic symbol (in square brackets), and equivalent representations inBopomofo andHanyu Pinyin.
It writes[-ɤ] as-o afterkʻ,k andh, otherwise as-ê:kʻo,ko,ho,shê,chʻê. When[ɤ] forms a syllable on its own, it is writtenê oro depending on the character.
Wade–Giles writes[-wo] as-uo afterkʻ,k,h andsh, otherwise as-o:kʻuo,kuo,huo,shuo,bo,tso. Afterchʻ, it is writtenchʻo orchʻuo depending on the character.
Giles'sA Chinese–English Dictionary also includes the finals-io (inyo,chio,chʻio,hsio,lio andnio) and-üo (inchüo,chʻüo,hsüo,lüo andnüo), both of which are pronounced-üeh in modernStandard Chinese:yüeh,chüeh,chʻüeh,hsüeh,lüeh andnüeh.
Examples using the spiritus asper:p,pʻ,t,tʻ,k,kʻ,ch,chʻ. The use of this character preservesb,d,g, andj for the romanization ofChinese varieties containingvoiced consonants, such asShanghainese (which has a full set of voiced consonants) andMin Nan (Hō-ló-oē) whose century-oldPe̍h-ōe-jī (POJ, often called Missionary Romanization) is similar to Wade–Giles. POJ,Legge romanization,Simplified Wade, andEFEO Chinese transcription use the letter⟨h⟩ instead of an apostrophe-like character to indicate aspiration. (This is similar to the obsoleteIPA convention before therevisions of the 1970s). The convention of an apostrophe-like character or⟨h⟩ to denote aspiration is also found in romanizations of other Asian languages, such asMcCune–Reischauer forKorean andISO 11940 forThai.
People unfamiliar with Wade–Giles often ignore the spiritus asper, sometimes omitting them when copying texts, unaware that they represent vital information. Hànyǔ Pīnyīn addresses this issue by employing the Latin letters customarily used for voiced stops, unneeded in Mandarin, to represent the unaspirated stops:b, p, d, t, g, k, j, q, zh, ch.
Partly because of the popular omission of apostrophe-like characters, the four sounds represented in Hànyǔ Pīnyīn byj,q,zh, andch often all becomech, including in many proper names. However, if the apostrophe-like characters are kept, the system reveals a symmetry that leaves no overlap:
The non-retroflexch (Pīnyīnj) andchʻ (Pīnyīnq) are always before eitherü ori, but neverih.
Theretroflexch (Pīnyīnzh) andchʻ (Pīnyīnch) are always beforeih,a,ê,e,o, oru.
Finalo in Wade–Giles has two pronunciations in modern Peking dialect:[wo] and[ɤ].
What is pronounced in vernacular Peking dialect as aclose-mid back unrounded vowel[ɤ] is written usually asê, but sometimes aso, depending on historical pronunciation (at the time Wade–Giles was developed). Specifically, after velar initialsk,kʻ andh (and a historicalng, which had been dropped by the time Wade–Giles was developed),o is used; for example, "哥" isko1 (Pīnyīngē) and "刻" iskʻo4[6] (Pīnyīnkè). In Peking dialect,o after velars (and what used to beng) have shifted to[ɤ], thus they are written asge,ke,he ande in Pīnyīn. When[ɤ] forms a syllable on its own, Wade–Giles writesê oro depending on the character. In all other circumstances, it writesê.
What is pronounced in Peking dialect as[wo] is usually written aso in Wade–Giles, except forwo,shuo (e.g. "說"shuo1) and the three syllables ofkuo,kʻuo, andhuo (as in 過, 霍, etc.), which contrast withko,kʻo, andho that correspond to Pīnyīnge,ke, andhe. This is because characters like 羅, 多, etc. (Wade–Giles:lo2,to1; Pīnyīn:luó,duō) did not originally carry the medial[w]. Peking dialect does not have phonemic contrast betweeno and-uo/wo (except in interjections when used alone) and a medial[w] is usually inserted in front of-o to form[wo].
Tones are indicated in Wade–Giles using superscript numbers (1–4) placed after the syllable. This contrasts with the use of diacritics to represent the tones in Pīnyīn. For example, the Pīnyīnqiàn (fourth tone) has the Wade–Giles equivalentchʻien4.
Wade–Giles useshyphens to separate all syllables within a word (whereas Pīnyīn separates syllables only in specially defined cases, using hyphens or closing (right) single quotation marks as appropriate).
If a syllable is not the first in a word, its first letter is notcapitalized, even if it is part of aproper noun. The use of apostrophe-like characters, hyphens, and capitalization is frequently not observed in place names and personal names. For example, the majority ofoverseasTaiwanese people write theirgiven names like "Tai Lun" or "Tai-Lun", whereas the Wade–Giles is actually "Tai-lun". (See alsoChinese names.)
Wade–Giles chose theFrench-like⟨j⟩ (implying a sound like IPA's[ʒ], as ins in Englishmeasure) to represent a Northern Mandarin pronunciation of what is represented as⟨r⟩ in pinyin (Northern Mandarin[ʐ]/ Southern Mandarin[ɻ]; generally consideredallophones).
Ü (representing/y/) always has anumlaut above, while pinyin only employs it in the cases ofnü,nüe,lü,lüe andlüan, while leaving it out afterj,q,x andy as a simplification because⟨u⟩/[u] cannot otherwise appear after those letters. (The vowel⟨u⟩/[u] can occur in those cases in pinyin where the diaeresis are indicated⟨ü⟩/[y] or[ɥ]; in which cases it serves to distinguish thefront vowel[y] from theback vowel[u]. By contrast it is always present to mark the front vowel in Wade–Giles.) Becauseyü (as in玉 "jade") must have an umlaut in Wade–Giles, the umlaut-lessyu in Wade–Giles is freed up for what corresponds toyou (有 "have"/"there is") in Pinyin.
The Pīnyīn cluster⟨-ong⟩ is⟨-ung⟩ in Wade–Giles, reflecting the pronunciation of[ʊ] as in Englishbook/bʊk/. (Comparekung1-fu togōngfu as an example.)
After a consonant, both Wade–Giles and Pīnyīn use⟨-iu⟩ and⟨-un⟩ instead of the complete syllables:⟨-iou⟩ and⟨-uên⟩/⟨-uen⟩.
Note: In Hànyǔ Pīnyīn, the so-called neutral tone is written leaving the syllable with no diacritic mark at all. In Tongyòng Pinyin, a ring is written over the vowel.
It consistently usesi for the syllable[i], while Wade–Giles usesi oryi depending on the character.
It useso for the syllable[ɤ], while Wade–Giles usesê oro depending on the character.
It offers the choice betweenssŭ andszŭ, while Wade–Giles requiresssŭ.
It does not use the spellingschio,chʻio,hsio,yo, replacing them withchüeh,chʻüeh,hsüeh,yüeh in accordance with their modern pronunciations.
It uses an underscored3 to denote a second tone which comes from an original third tone, but only if the following syllable has the neutral tone and thetone sandhi is therefore not predictable:hsiao3•chieh.
It denotes the neutral tone by placing a dot (if the neutral tone is compulsory) or a circle (if the neutral tone is optional) before the syllable. The dot or circle replaces the hyphen.
Wade, Thomas Francis.A progressive course designed to assist the student of Colloquial Chinese (Yü Yen Tzǔ Êrh Chi) in two volumes. Third edition Shanghai: Hong Kong: Singapore: Yokohama: London: Kelly & Walsh, Limited, 1903.
Giles, Herbert A.A Chinese–English Dictionary. 2-vol. & 3-vol. versions both. London: Shanghai: Bernard Quaritch; Kelly and Walsh, 1892.Rev. & enlarged 2nd ed. in 3 vols. (Vol. I: front-matter &a-hsü,Vol. II:hsü-shao, andVol. III:shao-yün), Shanghai: Hong Kong: Singapore: Yokohama: London: Kelly & Walsh, Limited; Bernard Quaritch, 1912. Rpt. of the 2nd ed. but in 2 vols. and bound as 1, New York: Paragon Book Reprint Corp., 1964.
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