A BRIEF HISTORY OF MANDARIN.

• Author: COBLIN, W. SOUTH

The received view of standard Mandarin is that it has been Pekingese-based for at least six hundred years. Recent research, little known outside a small circle of specialists, has revealed that this view is flawed and that for most of its history this standard language had little to do with Pekingese. The present paper introduces these new developments to the academic community at large.

1. INTRODUCTION

   WHEN USED IN REFERENCE TO language, the term "Mandarin" has several distinct senses. Its first and oldest application was to the universal standard language or koine spoken by officials and educated people in traditional China during the Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1912) dynasties. In this use it parallels and may in fact be modeled on early southern European missionary expressions, such as la lengua mandarina, falla madarin, etc., which in turn directly render the native Chinese term guanhua [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] ("the language of the officials, or mandarins"), a compound first attested in mid-Ming times. More recently, historical linguists have extended the venue of the word "Mandarin" back to the Yuan period (1260- 1368); they refer to the putative standard language of that time as "Old Mandarin" (in Chinese, usually zaoq guanhua [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]). Concurrently, dialectologists and comparative linguists use "Mandarin" in reference to the entire fa mily of northern or northern-like Chinese speech forms which in modern Chinese are called beifang fangyan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] or guanhua fangyan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. And finally, "Mandarin," when not otherwise qualified, is often taken today as a designation for modern standard Chinese, the language now called guoyu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], putonghua [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] or Huayu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] in Chinese-speaking areas. In the present article, the word "Mandarin" will be understood in its oldest sense, and our primary concern will therefore be with the history of the spoken (as opposed to written) Chinese koine of the Ming and Qing periods. The received wisdom and currently prevalent view of this history is that Mandarin has throughout its life been identical with or closely based upon the language of the city of Peking. But recent research, still little known outside a small circle of specialists, has revealed that this view is basically flawed and that for most of its history standard Mandarin had little to do with Pekingese.

   In order to understand the history of Mandarin it is essential that we treat it in terms of three separate components, i.e., phonology, lexicon, and syntax. Consequently, our discussion will be organized around this tripartite division.

2. THE DEVELOPMENT OF MANDARIN PHONOLOGY

   Our clearest views of pre-modern Mandarin phonology come to us through foreign alphabetic transcriptions devised by non-Chinese who wished to learn and teach the standard language. The earliest of these transcriptions were recorded by the Korean sinologist and government interpreter, Sin Sukchu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (1417-75), and are written in the Han'gul alphabet. They are said by him to represent the "standard readings" (zhengyin [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]) of the period in which he wrote. Yuchi (1990: 18) argues from historical evidence that they reflect a form of fifteenth-century Guanhua and derive from detailed discussions between Sin and one Ni Qian [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], a Ming official who visited Korea in 1450. The "standard reading" forms are preserved in two sources, the Hongmu chong'un yokhun [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (completed in 1455), and the Sasong t'onggo [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASC II] (completed ca. 1450), a lost work whose spellings are preserved in the Sasong t'onghae [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (completed 1517) of Ch'we Sejin [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (1478?-1543). All of this material has been the subject of a recent study in English (Kim 1991). The details of Sin's "standard reading" system are not of primary concern to us here, but certain salient features of it can be noted as a matter of interest. The system possessed a separate series of "turbid" or zhuo [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] initial syllables, corresponding to the zhuo (sometimes called "voiced") initial class of the traditional Chinese phonologists, e.g., [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] baw [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] baw [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] dzy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] dzy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. [1] Sin's very precise description of these sounds suggests that the feature in question was not really voicing of syllable initials but rather some type of syllabic feature, such as murmur or strident breathiness, probably in subtle association with pitch register. The langu age had no separate series of palatal initials. Instead, gutturals and sibilants could occur freely before high front elements, e.g, [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] kin [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] tsin [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] xy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] sy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. In the syllable finals the most striking feature was a series of checked finals ending in a glottal stop [-?]. There were also interesting vowel configurations. For example, the present-day homophones guan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] and guan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] differed in vocalism and were realized as kwon [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] and kwan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] respectively. Another notable characteristic was the presence of final -m in certain syllables, e.g., [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] sim [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPR ODUCIBLE IN ASCII] sam [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. There were five tones, yinping [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] yangping [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] shang [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] qu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] and ru [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII]. All ru tone syllables had the final glottal stop, and this sound occurred only in ru tone, e.g., [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] baj [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] phonetically: [bej?]; [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] ru [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII], phonetically: [ru?].

   What were the origins, historically and geographically, of the sound system recorded by Sin Sukchu? Sin himself has nothing to say on this matter. Comparison of his system with that represented in the Yuan-period syllabary, Zhongyuan yinyun [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (published 1324), shows significant differences, both in general features and in numerous points of detail. If, as is sometimes averred, the Zhongyuan yinyun reflects the pronunciation used at the Yuan capital, Dadu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] (later to become Peking), then the Sin system must have originated somewhere other than the Peking area. [2] It is also interesting to compare Sin's forms with those found in 'Phags-pa Chinese orthography. The 'Phags-pa system was devised n the 1260s, somewhat before the founding of the Yuan capital in 1276. It seems to be a mixed or composite entity and may to some extent be a conflation of several standard sound systems current in immediately pre-Yuan times (Coblin 1999). 1t bears many striking resemblances to Sin Sukchu's "standard reading" system. Let us now consider again the same syllables cited as examples in the preceding paragraph. Forms in square brackets indicate phonetic interpretations of orthographic spellings. Hypothetical reconstructed Zhongyuan yinyun forms are added from Pulleyblank (1991) for comparison.

   'Phags-pa System Sin System [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN baw [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] paw [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [baw] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN baw [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] paw [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [baw] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN dzy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] cyu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [dzy] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN dzy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] cyu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [dzy] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ki[eta] [CHINESE CHARACTERS ASCII] gying [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [kji[eta]] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN tsi[eta] [CHINESE CHARACTERS ASCII] dzing [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [tsi[eta]] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN xy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] hyu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [xy] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN sy [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] syu [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [sy] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN kwon [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] gon [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [kon] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN kwan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] gwan [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] REPRODUCIBLE IN ASCII] [kwan] [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN sim [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT ASCII] sim [CHINESE CHARACTERS NOT REPRODUCIBLE IN...