| Yunjing | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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 Title page of theYonglu edition | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 韻鏡 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 韵镜 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Literal meaning | Mirror of rhymes | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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TheYunjing (simplified Chinese:韵镜;traditional Chinese:韻鏡;pinyin:Yùnjìng;lit. 'Mirror of rhymes') is one of the two oldest existing examples of a Chineserime table – a series of charts which arrangeChinese characters in large tables according to their tone and syllable structures to indicate their proper pronunciations. Current versions of theYunjing date to AD 1161 and 1203 editions published by Zhang Linzhi (張麟之). The original author(s) and date of composition of theYunjing are unknown. Some of its elements, such as certain choices in its ordering, reflect features particular to theTang dynasty, but no conclusive proof of an actual date of composition has yet been found.
TheYunjing contains 43 tables (Chinese:轉;pinyin:zhuǎn;lit. 'turnings'), each of which tabulates combinations of a particular final rhyme (listed in rows) with various initials (listed in columns), in up to four tones, to show in a grid pattern all possible syllables. Empty circles on the grid denote that the authors were unaware of any word with that particular pronunciation. By locating a character inYunjing, a reader could identify its initial consonant (by looking at its column) and its "rhyme", or main vowel and ending consonant (by looking at its row), and combine the two to obtain the word's pronunciation. Zhang Linzhi's prefaces list a total of 36 possible initial consonants (聲母;shēngmǔ) – by comparison, modernStandard Chinese only has 23 and modernCantonese only has 18 or 19.
Historical Chinese phonology uses theYunjing as an accurate representation ofLate Middle Chinese (10th–12th century) phonology. TheYunjing's use of this system represents a significant advancement in the Chinese' analysis of their own language, and is believed to have been inspired by their studies ofSanskrit phonological treatises andBuddhist mantras written in theSiddham script during theSui and Tang dynasties.
Each of the 43 tables in theYunjing is first divided into four large rows that correspond to thefour tones of Middle Chinese: the level tone (Chinese:平聲;pinyin:píngshēng), the rising tone (Chinese:上聲;pinyin:shǎngshēng), the departing tone (Chinese:去聲;pinyin:qùshēng), and the entering tone (Chinese:入聲;pinyin:rùshēng).[1] They are not explicitly marked as such, but the four characters are taken from each of the tone categories of theGuangyunrhyme dictionary. In the image at right, the first row – the level tone – is occupied by the level tone rhymedōng 東, the second row – the rising tone – by thedǒng 董 rhyme, the third row – the departing tone – bysòng 送, and the fourth row – the entering tone – bywū 屋 (Cantonese: uk1).
Each large row is further subdivided into four grades or divisions (Chinese:等;pinyin:děng), forming four rows within each larger row. Characters' placement in the first through fourth grade seems to be related to theirmedial (glide) and main vowel, though their exact distinction is unclear.[1]
Each table is divided into six large columns representing syllables'place of articulation:
Large columns are further subdivided into two to five smaller columns, which can represent one of four possible sub-categories:[2]
TheYunjing tables have only 23 columns – some columns represent more than one of the 36 possible initial consonants. Other rhyme tables, such as theQieyun zhizhangtu (Chinese:切韻指掌圖), do not combine the initials and have 36 full columns.[2]
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