| Eastern Han Chinese | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Later Han Chinese | |||||||||||
| Native to | China | ||||||||||
| Era | Eastern Han dynasty | ||||||||||
Early form | |||||||||||
| Clerical script | |||||||||||
| Language codes | |||||||||||
| ISO 639-3 | – | ||||||||||
| Glottolog | late1251 Late Han Chinese | ||||||||||
 Provinces of the Han dynastyc. 189 AD | |||||||||||
| Chinese name | |||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 晚期上古漢語 | ||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 晚期上古汉语 | ||||||||||
| Literal meaning | Late Old Chinese | ||||||||||
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Eastern Han Chinese, orLater Han Chinese, is the stage of theChinese language attested inpoetry and glosses from theEastern Han period (1st–3rd centuries AD). It is considered an intermediate stage betweenOld Chinese and theMiddle Chinese of the 7th-centuryQieyun rime dictionary.Min varieties are thought to be descended from southeastern dialects of this period.
Schuessler (2009) remarks that Later Han Chinese, as reconstructed by him, "could, with hindsight, be considered Middle Han Chinese of the first centuries BC and AD".[1]
The rhyming practice of Han poets has been studied since the Qing period as an intermediate stage between theClassic of Poetry of theWestern Zhou period andTang poetry. The definitive reference was compiled byLuo Changpei and Zhou Zumo in 1958. This work identifies the rhyme classes of the period, but leaves the phonetic value of each class open.[2]
During the Eastern Han, Confucian scholars were bitterly divided between different versions of the classics: the officially recognized New Texts, and rediscovered versions written in a pre-Qin script known as theOld Texts. To support their challenge to the orthodox position on the classics, Old Text scholars produced many philological studies. Many of these works contain remarks of various types on the pronunciation of various words.[3] The sources with the most glosses are theShiming, a dictionary of classical terms,Xu Shen'sShuowen Jiezi (c. 100 AD), a study of the history and structure ofChinese characters, andZheng Xuan's commentaries on various classics.[4]
Buddhism also expanded greatly in China during the Eastern Han period. Buddhist missionaries, beginning withAn Shigao in AD 148, began translating Buddhist texts into Chinese.[5][6] These translations include transcriptions in Chinese characters ofSanskrit andPrakrit vocabulary, which were first systematically mined for evidence of the evolution of Chinese phonology byEdwin G. Pulleyblank.[7]
TheShiming glosses were collected and studied byNicholas Bodman.[8]Weldon South Coblin collected all the remaining glosses and transcriptions, and used them in an attempt to reconstruct an intermediate stage betweenOld Chinese andMiddle Chinese, both represented by the reconstructions ofLi Fang-Kuei.[9] Axel Schuessler included reconstructed pronunciations (under the name Later Han Chinese) in his dictionary of Old Chinese.[10][11]
The customary writing style of the period was strongly modelled on the classics, and thus provides only occasional glimpses of contemporary grammar.[12] Some works, while generally following the conventional archaizing style, contain passages in a more colloquial style thought to reflect contemporary speech, at least in part. Many such examples are found in translated Buddhist literature, particularlydirect speech.[13][14] Similarly,Zhao Qi's commentary onMencius includes paraphrases of the classic written for the benefit of novice students, and therefore in a more contemporary style.[15] Similar passages are also found in the commentaries ofWang Yi,Zheng Xuan andGao You.[16]
Several texts contain evidence of dialectal variation in the Eastern Han period. TheFangyan, from the start of the period, discusses variations in regional vocabulary. By analysing the text,Paul Serruys identified six dialect areas: a central area centred on theCentral Plain east ofHangu Pass, surrounded by northern, eastern, southern and western areas, and a southeastern area to the south and east of the lowerYangtze.[17][18][19] Distinct rhyme systems of the Han period poets identified by Luo and Zhou broadly correspond to these dialect areas.[20]
The most influential dialect was the Qin–Jin dialect, from the western group, reflecting the ascendancy of the state ofQin. Second was theChu dialect, from the southern group, which spread both to the south and to the east.These two dialects were also the principal sources of the Han standard language. The central dialects of the area of former states ofLu,Song andWei were the most conservative. The dialects of the eastern area, which had been more recently and slowly sinified, include some non-Chinese vocabulary.[21]
The Eastern Han glosses come from 11 sites, all to the north of theHuai River.[22] They often show marked phonological differences. Many of them exhibit mergers that are not found in the 7th-centuryQieyun or in many modern varieties. The exception is the Buddhist transcriptions, which were made in the region ofLuoyang (in the western part of the central dialect area), suggesting that the later varieties descend from Han-period varieties spoken in this area.[23]
The southeastern dialects are not reflected in Eastern Han texts.They were known as Wu (吳) or Jiangdong (江東) dialects in theWestern Jin period, when the writerGuo Pu described them as quite distinct from other varieties.[24][25]Jerry Norman called these Han-era southeastern dialects Old Southern Chinese, and suggested that they were the source of common features found in the oldest layers of modernYue,Hakka andMin varieties.[26]
Eastern Han Chinese syllables consisted of an initial consonant, optional medialglides, a vowel and an optional coda.
The consonant clusters postulated for Old Chinese had generally disappeared by the Eastern Han period.[27][28]
| Labial | Dental | Sibilant | Palatal | Velar | Laryngeal | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Stop or affricate | voiceless | p | t | ts | (tɕ) | k | ʔ |
| aspirate | pʰ | tʰ | tsʰ | (tɕʰ) | kʰ | ||
| voiced | b | d | dz | (dʑ) | ɡ | ||
| Nasal | voiceless | (m̥) | (n̥) | (ŋ̊) | |||
| voiced | m | n | ŋ | ||||
| Lateral or fricative | voiceless | (l̥) | s | (ɕ) | x | ||
| voiced | l | z | (ʑ) | (ɣ) | |||
One of the major changes between Old Chinese and Middle Chinese was palatalization of initialdental stops and (in some environments)velar stops, merging to form a new series of palatal initials. Several Eastern Han varieties show either or both of these palatalizations.[30] However,Proto-Min, which branched off during the Han period, has palatalized velars but not dentals.[31] The retroflex stops and sibilants of Middle Chinese are not distinguished from plain stops and sibilants in the Eastern Han data.[32]
There is some uncertainty whether the Middle Chinese initialsg-,h- andhj- can all be derived from a single Old Chinese initial *ɡ-, or whether an additional fricative initial *ɣ- or *ɦ- must be reconstructed.[33] Most Eastern Han dialects have a single initial *ɡ- in such words, but some of them distinguish *ɡ- and *ɣ-.[34]
Some Eastern Han dialects show evidence of the voiceless sonorant initials postulated for Old Chinese, but they had disappeared by the Eastern Han period in most areas.[29] The Old Chinese voiceless lateral and nasal initials yielded a *tʰ initial in eastern dialects and *x in western ones.[35][36] By the Eastern Han, the Old Chinese voiced lateral had also evolved to *d or *j, depending on syllable type.[37] The gap was filled by Old Chinese *r, which yielded Eastern Han *l and Middle Chinesel.[38] In some Eastern Han dialects, this initial may have been a lateraltap or flap.[39]
Most modern reconstructions of Old Chinese distinguishlabiovelar and labiolaryngeal initials from the velar andlaryngeal series. However, the two series are not separated in Eastern Han glosses, suggesting that Eastern Han Chinese had a *-w- medial like Middle Chinese. Moreover, this medial also occurs after other initials, including syllables with Old Chinese *-u- and *-o- before acute codas (*-n, *-t and *-j), which had broken to *-wə- and *-wa- respectively.[40][41][42] Most OC reconstructions include a medial *-r- to account for Middle Chinese retroflex initials, division-II finals and somechongniu finals, and this seems to have still been a distinct phoneme in the Eastern Han period.[43]
Since the pioneering work ofBernhard Karlgren, it has been common to project the palatal medial of Middle Chinese division-III syllables back to an Old Chinese medial *-j-, but this has been challenged by several authors, partly because Eastern Han Buddhist transcriptions use such syllables for foreign words lacking any palatal element.[44] However, Coblin points out that this practice continued into the Tang period, for which a-j- medial is generally accepted.[45] Scholars agree that the difference reflects a real phonological distinction, but there have been a range of proposals for its realization in early periods.[46] The distinction is variously described in Eastern Han commentaries:[47]
Most recent reconstructions of Old Chinese identify six vowels, *i, *ə, *u, *e, *a and *o.[51]Eastern Han rhyming practice indicates that some of the changes found in Middle Chinese had already occurred:
| Old Chinese | Middle Chinese |
|---|---|
| *-ja | -jo |
| -jæ | |
| *-jaj | |
| -je | |
| *-je |
The Middle Chinese finals-jo and-je occur with finals of all kinds, while-jæ occurs only after plain sibilant and palatal initials, with no known conditioning factor.[54]
The Middle Chinese codas-p,-t,-k,-m and-ng are projected back onto Eastern Han Chinese.[55]The Middle Chinese coda-n also appears to reflect*-n in most cases, but in some cases reflects vocalic codas in some Eastern Han varieties.[56]Baxter andSagart argue that these words had a coda*-r in Old Chinese, which became*-j inShandong and adjacent areas, and*-n elsewhere.[57]
Middle Chinese syllables with vocalic or nasal codas fell into threetonal categories, traditionally known as even, rising and departing tones, with syllables having stop codas assigned to a fourth "entering tone" category.[58]André-Georges Haudricourt suggested that the Middle Chinese departing tone derived from an Old Chinese final*-s, later weakening to*-h.[59]Several Buddhist transcriptions indicate that*-s was still present in the Eastern Han period in words derived from Old Chinese*-ts.[60]Other departing tone syllables may have become*-h by the Eastern Han period, as suggested by a slight preference to use them to transcribe Indic long vowels.[61]Based on Haudricourt's analysis of Vietnamese tones,Edwin Pulleyblank suggested that the Middle Chinese rising tone derived from Old Chinese*-ʔ.[59]Syllables in this category were avoided when transcribing long vowels in the Eastern Han period, suggesting that they were shorter, possibly reflecting this final glottal stop.[61]
In comparison with Warring States texts, colloquial Eastern Han texts display a massive increase in compoundcontent words in clearly distinguishedword classes.[62][63]They also make much less use offunction words in favour ofperiphrasis.[62][64]
The monosyllabic words of the classical period were largely replaced by disyllabic compounds with clearly defined syntactic roles:[65]
The widespread use ofmeasure words between numerals or demonstratives and nouns, a characteristic of the modern language, began in the Han period and became more extensive in the followingNorthern and Southern dynasties period.[66]
Old Chinese had a range of personal pronouns, including case distinctions.In the Eastern Han, these were reduced to first personwǒ我 and second personrǔ汝.[67][68]Similarly, the demonstratives were almost exclusively reduced toshì是 'this',ěr爾 'such' andbǐ彼 'that'.[69]Both kinds of pronouns were often used with plural suffixes-děng等,-bèi輩 and-cáo曹.[67]Most of the interrogatives of Old Chinese were replaced with periphrastic forms.[70]
The demonstrativeshì是 also came to be used as acopular verb in sentences of the form A是 B (as in modern Chinese), replacing the typical classical pattern A B也 (yě).[71][72][73]Unlike any other verb,shì是 was not negated withbù不 – the negative copulafēi非 was retained from the classical language.[74]
In classical texts, the particleqǐ豈 marked a rhetorical question, for which a negative answer was expected, but in the Eastern Han it was a general question marker.[64][75]At the same time, a new question markerníng寧 appeared.[64][76]
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