I started to orientate myself in the chinese language. After finding out that it is way too hard learn I stopped after a few weeks. One year later I realized that mandarin is one of the best languages to learn, for example because people like you who make these good tutorials and support chinese learners 👍
IT'S HIS grain he Winnowed it himself from the Winnowing Basket It's not only a basket like yong; it's a particular thing namely a winnowing basket/dustpan. Seal script version he is bent over carrying HIS Winnowing Basket on HIS back with HIS grain; alternatively the winnowing basket is on a table. I do think it's not merely a transfer character used as a purely phonetic marker. There are also pictographic elements (two drops of grain on the bottom / two hands working the winnowing basket in current form) as well as semantic idea of IT is HIS grain because he Winnowed IT. Great video! Thanks so much!
yes, jin1 = axe. i learned that it's originally a digging/chopping tool. it meant any type of working tool (as opposed to fighting tools). thanks for doing this series! HAPPY NEW YEAR xin nian kuai le!
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The character 黎 has a 小篆 (seal script) . But the upper right component does not seem to occur as a character on its own, I haven't found any explanation or lexical entry for this component. Does it occur elsewhere but with a different shape?
Hello. I researched the character a bit and it's and interesting case. Here's what I think is happening. The basics: 黎 is a 形聲字 Meaning: 'numerous, many'. Pronunciation: lí. Semantic element （形符）: the bottom 水 (pointing to the meaning 'numerous, many') Phonetic element （聲符）: the top 𥝢 lì (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A2) In case of doubt that 𥝢 is the phonetic element, it is relatively easy to prove. There are plenty of other characters with the pronunciation of lì/lí where 𥝢 is the phonetic (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A2%2B). 水 points to the meaning 'many, numerous' pretty well and I personally don't think there is a need to prove this. Structural explanation of 黎 : When they were creating the Seal script version of 黎 (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E9%BB%8E) for some reason, they looked at the character not as 𥝢 over 水 but rather 黍 and 勹 + 丿。 That is the reason for 人 over 水 in 黎 because if you look at the seal script of 黍 (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E9%BB%8D) you can clearly see the 'legs' of 禾 'hugging' the bottom 水 so when they created 黎 they 'ripped' away the top of 禾 and placed it to the top left leaving 人 over 水 at the bottom and placed the 勹 + 丿at the top right. So much for the structural part explaining why is 黎 made of 禾 人 水 and 勹+丿 Now for the mysterious 勹+丿 If you look at the 𥝢 entry (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A2) you see that 利 is listed as a variant of 𥝢 and if you then go and look at the 利 entry (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E5%88%A9) you can see another variant of 利 which is 𥝤 (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A4). So now we work with the idea that the top of 黎 is actually 利 and we have to analyze the 利 character if we want to figure out what is the mysterious 勹 +丿 thing: According to 說文新証 利 in 甲骨文 in the 利 character the right side (today written as刂 which is 刀) was usually written as 刀 but later also with one ( 勹 +丿) or two (勹 +丿+丿) more strokes. So the authors are guessing the right side of 利 might have been: 1) the modern 刀 2) the modern 勿 (meaning 'scrape with a knife' at the time) 3) the modern 爪 (not necessarily meaning 爪 at the time as it might have only been a simplified 勿 4) the modern 刃 (not necessarily meaning 刃 at the time as it might have only been an 'ornamented' 刀）. I'm undecided, but my personal take on this is that 勹 +丿is only a more fancy 刀 but still it's the 刀 character. Finally, in case we wonder whether 勹 +丿 in 𥝢 is really the modern 勹 with an added stroke, it's very probably not the case, because 勹 is a variant of 句 which is an evolutionary branch of the 丩 character (all according to the researchers from 說文新証） See: 丩：ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E4%B8%A9 句：ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E5%8C%85 and 勹 and 句 and 丩 were all written very differently than 刀 or 刃 or 爪 or 勿 So to answer your question, I personally think that the 勹 +丿 in 黎 is just a variant of the 刀 character. And..if I may ask, what does your question have to do with the content of the video?:)
The element for moon, yue, in that second character of the series looks like the element for meat/flesh. How do you tell them apart? Is it because its quite short next to the qi?
On a computer, unless it's a special font, I don't think you can distinguish it. 月 is both 'meat' and 'moon'. In some specialized fonts the two 二 strokes in 月 are written as 冫 when 月 means meat (fonts like MingLiu, STXingKai). I never thought about it, but this should actually be the distinction when you write the two radicals by hand too.
Great video, although I could correct your explanation on 斯. 斯 is pronounced as “si” in Cantonese, while 其 is “kei”, so they don’t actually rhyme in this case (although typically the qi and si sounds do end up rhyming perfectly in most Sino-Xenic languages other than Mandarin). 其 is not the phonetic component of 斯 - in Old Chinese they were pronounced as “gɯ” and “se” respectively, and thus have nothing to do with each other phonetic-wise. Although pretty much nobody knows what is exactly going on here, considering that there are many other characters with 斤 that don’t seem to hold phonetic clues - 斬, 質, 斷, 析, 折 - it is possible that the 斤 is a semantic component in an ideogrammic compound or an abbreviated phonetic component (the former being most likely due to 撕 meaning “tear/rip” and 斤 historically meaning “axe”).
Hello and thank you for the comment. This is what rhyme dictionaries tell us about 其 and 斯： 其 《唐韻》《集韻》《韻會》渠之切 《正韻》渠宜切，𠀤音碁。 《唐韻》《集韻》《韻會》𠀤居之切，音姬。 《集韻》《韻會》居吏切。 《正韻》吉器切，𠀤音寄。 ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E5%85%B6 上古音系 Rhyme group: 韻部 之 ytenx.org/zim?dzih=%E5%85%B6&dzyen=1&jtkb=1&jtkd=1&jtdt=1&jtgt=1 斯 《廣韻》息移切 《集韻》《韻會》相支切，𠀤音私。 《集韻》山宜切，音釃。 《集韻》斯義切，音賜。 《韻補》叶新於切。 ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E6%96%AF 上古音系 Rhyme group: 韻部 支 ytenx.org/zim?dzih=%E6%96%AF&dzyen=1&jtkb=1&jtkd=1&jtdt=1&jtgt=1 Of course there is room for error, but based on the above, I think the following proves that 其 and 斯 rhymed throughout history: Looking at the pronunciation from 廣韻 and onwards there was always a yi/zhi final in both 其 and 斯。 Looking at even older reconstructions （上古音系）, they belonged to very similar rhyme groups 支 and 之。Actually in Mandarin even today these characters are both pronounced the same (zhi1) it seems in Cantonese too (zi1) and based on historical phonetic tables had the same 而 final (with a different initial). If they rhyme now it is a strong indicator that they rhymed back when 其 and 斯 were created. What this means is that bypassing phonetic reconstructions which are often erroneous and working only with hard facts from Historical rhyme dictionaries we can say that 其 and 斯 had the same final historically and rhymed perfectly, therefore 其 is the phonetic in 斯。
Additionally, there are at least 7 characters where 其 is the phonetic which have previously had the 宜 final, which is the the same historical final of 斯 had as well (further proving that 其 and 斯 perfectly rhymed): 祺𤷍蜝錤騏麒鶀 And there are at least four characters where 斯 is the phonetic and had 宜 as the final as well, tying 其 to 斯 even more: 凘撕澌簛
I’ve done some digging around on rhyme dictionaries, and found that the finals for 其, 之, 史, and 器 would often coincide with each other, while those for 支, 宜, 移, and 義 also overlapped with each other, but never crossed over between the two groups. Except for 正韻, but this was compiled during the Ming dynasty, suggesting that the two groups had begun to gain similarity before the 15th century but were distinct before the 7th century when 切韻 was first published. As such, I’m not quite sure how what you’ve shown proves that the two groups have always rhymed historically. Additionally, the reconstructions from Zhengzhang, Baxter, Sagart, Pan Wuyun, Shao Rongfen, Pulleyblank, Li Rong, Wang Li, and Karlgren all agree that 之 and 其 rhyme, while 斯 and 支 rhyme, but the two pairs are distinct from each other. Finals aside, their initials are completely different and 95% of the time with phonetic components the initials would be related in some way.
@@vokzaal Hello again and thank you for the comment. (Sorry for the third reply, but the formatting kept being all over the place). I think the data from phonetic dictionaries I provided tie 其 to 斯 sufficiently in a direct manner, but as I wrote later, there is a lot of indirect evidence too: 祺𤷍蜝錤騏麒鶀 rhymed with 宜 其 also rhymed with 宜 斯 also rhymed with 宜 凘撕澌簛 also rhymed with 宜 If both 其 and 斯 are systematically used as phonetic elements in characters which rhymed with 宜 and both 其 and 斯 also rhymed with 宜 and since 其 is suspected to be the phonetic element in 斯 there is a very high chance 其 really is the phonetic element in 斯 Also, 祺𤷍蜝錤騏麒鶀 and 凘撕澌簛 are a lot of characters. 其 and 斯 were obviously systematically used as phonetic elements in characters that rhymed with 宜。I mention this, because often much less evidence is needed and it all just points to the fact that 其 and 斯 rhymed with 宜 as well. This is just hard historical data and regardless of whether we have information from 廣韻 or 正韻 it independently proves there is a systematic relation between 其 and 斯 (and a bit lower I will show direct evidence from 廣韻 too). Moreover we can prove that 斤 is the semantic element in 斯 because 斯 is defined as: 《說文》析也。 《爾雅·釋言》斯，離也。 This shows that 斤 is the semantic element pointing to the original meaning of 斯 'to separate' and what is left, 其 is thus the phonetic element (making this assumption in conjunction with the pronunciation ties I wrote about earlier). There are characters where all elements of the character seem to have a semantic value only (even though there is a theory that there are no such characters and that all multiple element characters have a phonetic element in them), but there is too much phonetic evidence tying 其 to 斯 for a reasonable assumption that 斯 is a phono-semantic character with 其 being its phonetic element and 斤 its semantic element. Even though often wrong, even Shuowen says 其 is the phonetic in 斯: 《斤部》斯：析也。从斤其聲。 If you need clear pre 正韻 evidence that 其 and 斯 rhymed, there is clear evidence in 廣韻 itself: 其：《廣韻·上平聲·之·其》 其：《廣韻·上平聲·之·姬》 斯：《廣韻·上平聲·支·斯》 I don't know how much you know about 廣韻 but the 之 and 支 characters indicate the rhyme class 其 and 斯 are in. If you look here: zh-yue.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%94%9D You can clearly see that 之 and 支 are in the same 止攝 with the -i final. This means that 之 and 支 rhymed in 廣韻 and this means that 其 and 斯 Rhymed in 廣韻 as well. Of course there is room for error and a margin for interpretation, but what I wrote does tie 其 to 斯 considerably. There are instances where much less evidence is necessary to prove these relations. Ad Phonetic reconstructions: I'm sure you know that phonetic reconstructions of Old Chinese are imprecise with a lot of room for error (which doesn't mean they are wrong in this case of course). More importantly, they might be completely correct, but they are tracing back the incorrect modern pronunciation. I'm sure you know that most Chinese characters have several modern pronunciations. Most Chinese characters also have a lot of lost historical pronunciations. For the sake of example: 會 has two modern pronunciations: hui4 and kuai4 and a rare pronunciation gui4. Apart from this it has a lost historical pronunciation which would lead to the modern huo4. If you only reconstruct the Old Chinese pronunciation of 會 hui4, for example, and nothing else, then you will have a very hard time tying it to the Old Chinese reconstruction of 𨭗 which today is pronounced guo2. This directly leads to my second point: It is quite difficult sometimes to tell what was one pronunciation 1000 years ago in the time of 廣韻 and 2 pronunciations today and what was two pronunciations 1000 years ago and 2 today. In other words one historical pronunciation might have diverged into two modern pronunciations but if a character has two modern pronunciations today, it doesn't mean that they come from a single original pronunciation. It might have had one original pronunciation acquiring a completely different and unrelated one. In the case of 會 all four pronunciations of the character hui4, kuai4, gui4 and huo4 might come only from one root but they also don't have to. With a lot of research and a lot of data it is possible to have an idea about what happened, but in many cases it's impossible. This is even more valid for Old Chinese reconstructions and I try to keep this in mind when I see historical reconstructions of Old Chinese. I prefer to work with rhyme dictionaries and use Old Chinese reconstructions as a reference only. Additionally, character pronunciations tend to diverge as time progresses and not converge. In other words: kuo + (1000 years pass) = 1. kuo and 2. huo and not 1. kuo and 2. huo + (1000 years pass) = kuo. I'm saying this because if there was a small difference in the pronunciation of 其 and 斯 in 廣韻 and 說文解字 says 其 is the phonetic in 斯, it is consistent with pronunciation divergence over time, which is another supporting argument that 其 can be the phonetic element in 斯 "Finals aside, their initials are completely different and 95% of the time with phonetic components the initials would be related in some way." This is an interesting statement. Would you have a study that you could point me to? I don't think the statement is true, but I'm interested in reading about it.
I apologise if what I’m saying is from an uninformed perspective, as I have not used rhyme dictionaries as a source of understanding and may have been greatly misled by reconstructions. However, there are still a few details within your reasoning that I’d like to discuss further, as what I’m seeing in front of me seems quite contradictory. Firstly, I’d like to know why 支 and 之 have their own classes if both 其 and 斯 are under the 止攝, especially when sub-categories of a 攝 tend to have very different finals. Whether or not their listing indicates similarity, I’d like to point out that 廣韻 was published during the beginning of the 11th century, and 5 centuries had passed since 切韻 which is supposed to represent Middle Chinese (or the first period, while 廣韻 represents the second period) so their final may have merged only by then. Secondly, I’m a little confused at how you’re addressing reconstructions. Are you suggesting that they are incorrect due to mistakes, or am I not understanding the purpose behind reconstructions and that the linguists behind them have deliberately not told the full story? I’m asking this because nine different linguists have agreed on the distinction between the finals of 之 and 支, and additional pronunciations of characters in Middle Chinese are written when applicable. Assuming that 之 and 支 did not rhyme in Old Chinese, I acknowledge that 其 could be the phonetic component of 斯 as part of an alternate pronunciation, but until further clarification I don’t think that the qi and si pronunciations are affiliated with each other. As for my claim on initials, 95% is certainly an overstatement - the true number would be closer to 80-85%. Unfortunately, this statement does not come from any reputable publication, but rather from my own observations and understanding of (modern) Chinese phonetics across Sino-Xenic languages. However, I don’t believe that I’ve come across many phonetic series with both k- and alveolar/alveolo-palatal initials other than l- (from the perspective of Cantonese or Japanese), and the only one I can think of off the top of my head is between 燒 and 澆 (well, the initials of 堯’s characters are ridiculously varying anyway). In any case, phonetic components nearly always take both initials and finals into account very systematically, and having h/g/k and s/ɕ/etc. together is quite rare (again, from what I’ve seen in modern languages).
Hello. This is maybe the 15th lecture in the series. I go very slowly in the first 5 lectures and explain everything in detail. A lot of people thought it was unnecessary to go so slowly in the following lectures since everything was explained in detail in the first couple of ones and I agree. If you want to understand the basic concepts, it is sufficient to watch the first lecture. It is redundant to repeat the basics with every video. Each video would be 30 minutes long.
Understanding Chinese Characters Are they in progression? (From my viewing experience you jump around). I’ve been following from a point of understanding, and you’ve lost me. It s ok. I’m sorry. Humility is our greatest power.
Thank you. They are in progression. I created a playlist for these videos but not sure hot to share it properly, so hope this link takes you there: th-cam.com/play/PLG2KFyEG82PfbpDNoe9g45Gh6zt04WLuk.html
Great series, thank you!
I started to orientate myself in the chinese language. After finding out that it is way too hard learn I stopped after a few weeks.
One year later I realized that mandarin is one of the best languages to learn, for example because people like you who make these good tutorials and support chinese learners 👍
Thank you for the nice comment:) Good luck with your studies.
IT'S HIS grain he Winnowed it himself from the Winnowing Basket
It's not only a basket like yong; it's a particular thing namely a winnowing basket/dustpan.
Seal script version he is bent over carrying HIS Winnowing Basket on HIS back with HIS grain; alternatively the winnowing basket is on a table.
I do think it's not merely a transfer character used as a purely phonetic marker. There are also pictographic elements (two drops of grain on the bottom / two hands working the winnowing basket in current form) as well as semantic idea of IT is HIS grain because he Winnowed IT.
Great video! Thanks so much!
Thank you for your amazing efforts. You’re great
Very interesting video, these are addicting
yes, jin1 = axe. i learned that it's originally a digging/chopping tool. it meant any type of working tool (as opposed to fighting tools).
thanks for doing this series! HAPPY NEW YEAR xin nian kuai le!
axe character is used in the gong jin1 de jin1 = pound / half kg. it's a fairly frequent character.
Thank you:) Happy new year to you too.
Jak zwykle ciekawie opowiedziane. Należysz do tej kategorii twórców, którym można dać łapkę w górę jeszcze przed obejrzeniem materiału. Dzięki za Twoją pracę :). Szczęśliwego Nowego Roku.
Dziekuje bardzo Anna:)
The character 黎 has a 小篆 (seal script) . But the upper right component does not seem to occur as a character on its own, I haven't found any explanation or lexical entry for this component. Does it occur elsewhere but with a different shape?
Hello. I researched the character a bit and it's and interesting case. Here's what I think is happening.
The basics:
黎 is a 形聲字
Meaning: 'numerous, many'.
Pronunciation: lí.
Semantic element （形符）: the bottom 水 (pointing to the meaning 'numerous, many')
Phonetic element （聲符）: the top 𥝢 lì (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A2)
In case of doubt that 𥝢 is the phonetic element, it is relatively easy to prove. There are plenty of other characters with the pronunciation of lì/lí where 𥝢 is the phonetic (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A2%2B).
水 points to the meaning 'many, numerous' pretty well and I personally don't think there is a need to prove this.
Structural explanation of 黎 :
When they were creating the Seal script version of 黎 (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E9%BB%8E) for some reason, they looked at the character not as 𥝢 over 水 but rather 黍 and 勹 + 丿。 That is the reason for 人 over 水 in 黎 because if you look at the seal script of 黍 (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E9%BB%8D) you can clearly see the 'legs' of 禾 'hugging' the bottom 水 so when they created 黎 they 'ripped' away the top of 禾 and placed it to the top left leaving 人 over 水 at the bottom and placed the 勹 + 丿at the top right.
So much for the structural part explaining why is 黎 made of 禾 人 水 and 勹+丿
Now for the mysterious 勹+丿
If you look at the 𥝢 entry (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A2) you see that 利 is listed as a variant of 𥝢 and if you then go and look at the 利 entry (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E5%88%A9) you can see another variant of 利 which is 𥝤 (ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%F0%A5%9D%A4).
So now we work with the idea that the top of 黎 is actually 利 and we have to analyze the 利 character if we want to figure out what is the mysterious 勹 +丿 thing:
According to 說文新証 利 in 甲骨文 in the 利 character the right side (today written as刂 which is 刀) was usually written as 刀 but later also with one ( 勹 +丿) or two (勹 +丿+丿) more strokes.
So the authors are guessing the right side of 利 might have been:
1) the modern 刀
2) the modern 勿 (meaning 'scrape with a knife' at the time)
3) the modern 爪 (not necessarily meaning 爪 at the time as it might have only been a simplified 勿
4) the modern 刃 (not necessarily meaning 刃 at the time as it might have only been an 'ornamented' 刀）.
I'm undecided, but my personal take on this is that 勹 +丿is only a more fancy 刀 but still it's the 刀 character.
Finally, in case we wonder whether 勹 +丿 in 𥝢 is really the modern 勹 with an added stroke, it's very probably not the case, because 勹 is a variant of 句 which is an evolutionary branch of the 丩 character (all according to the researchers from 說文新証）
See:
丩：ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E4%B8%A9
句：ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E5%8C%85
and 勹 and 句 and 丩 were all written very differently than 刀 or 刃 or 爪 or 勿
So to answer your question, I personally think that the 勹 +丿 in 黎 is just a variant of the 刀 character.
And..if I may ask, what does your question have to do with the content of the video?:)
The element for moon, yue, in that second character of the series looks like the element for meat/flesh. How do you tell them apart? Is it because its quite short next to the qi?
On a computer, unless it's a special font, I don't think you can distinguish it. 月 is both 'meat' and 'moon'. In some specialized fonts the two 二 strokes in 月 are written as 冫 when 月 means meat (fonts like MingLiu, STXingKai). I never thought about it, but this should actually be the distinction when you write the two radicals by hand too.
@@theforeverastudent that's good to know, thanks vlad!
Great video, although I could correct your explanation on 斯.
斯 is pronounced as “si” in Cantonese, while 其 is “kei”, so they don’t actually rhyme in this case (although typically the qi and si sounds do end up rhyming perfectly in most Sino-Xenic languages other than Mandarin).
其 is not the phonetic component of 斯 - in Old Chinese they were pronounced as “gɯ” and “se” respectively, and thus have nothing to do with each other phonetic-wise. Although pretty much nobody knows what is exactly going on here, considering that there are many other characters with 斤 that don’t seem to hold phonetic clues - 斬, 質, 斷, 析, 折 - it is possible that the 斤 is a semantic component in an ideogrammic compound or an abbreviated phonetic component (the former being most likely due to 撕 meaning “tear/rip” and 斤 historically meaning “axe”).
Hello and thank you for the comment. This is what rhyme dictionaries tell us about 其 and 斯：
其
《唐韻》《集韻》《韻會》渠之切
《正韻》渠宜切，𠀤音碁。
《唐韻》《集韻》《韻會》𠀤居之切，音姬。
《集韻》《韻會》居吏切。
《正韻》吉器切，𠀤音寄。
ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E5%85%B6
上古音系 Rhyme group:
韻部 之
ytenx.org/zim?dzih=%E5%85%B6&dzyen=1&jtkb=1&jtkd=1&jtdt=1&jtgt=1
斯
《廣韻》息移切
《集韻》《韻會》相支切，𠀤音私。
《集韻》山宜切，音釃。
《集韻》斯義切，音賜。
《韻補》叶新於切。
ctext.org/dictionary.pl?if=en&char=%E6%96%AF
上古音系 Rhyme group:
韻部 支
ytenx.org/zim?dzih=%E6%96%AF&dzyen=1&jtkb=1&jtkd=1&jtdt=1&jtgt=1
Of course there is room for error, but based on the above, I think the following proves that 其 and 斯 rhymed throughout history:
Looking at the pronunciation from 廣韻 and onwards there was always a yi/zhi final in
both 其 and 斯。
Looking at even older reconstructions （上古音系）, they belonged to very similar rhyme groups 支 and 之。Actually in Mandarin even today these characters are both pronounced the same (zhi1) it seems in Cantonese too (zi1) and based on historical phonetic tables had the same 而 final (with a different initial). If they rhyme now it is a strong indicator that they rhymed back when 其 and 斯 were created.
What this means is that bypassing phonetic reconstructions which are often erroneous and working only with hard facts from Historical rhyme dictionaries we can say that 其 and 斯 had the same final historically and rhymed perfectly, therefore 其 is the phonetic in 斯。
Additionally, there are at least 7 characters where 其 is the phonetic which have previously had the 宜 final, which is the the same historical final of 斯 had as well (further proving that 其 and 斯 perfectly rhymed):
祺𤷍蜝錤騏麒鶀
And there are at least four characters where 斯 is the phonetic and had 宜 as the final as well, tying 其 to 斯 even more:
凘撕澌簛
I’ve done some digging around on rhyme dictionaries, and found that the finals for 其, 之, 史, and 器 would often coincide with each other, while those for 支, 宜, 移, and 義 also overlapped with each other, but never crossed over between the two groups.
Except for 正韻, but this was compiled during the Ming dynasty, suggesting that the two groups had begun to gain similarity before the 15th century but were distinct before the 7th century when 切韻 was first published. As such, I’m not quite sure how what you’ve shown proves that the two groups have always rhymed historically.
Additionally, the reconstructions from Zhengzhang, Baxter, Sagart, Pan Wuyun, Shao Rongfen, Pulleyblank, Li Rong, Wang Li, and Karlgren all agree that 之 and 其 rhyme, while 斯 and 支 rhyme, but the two pairs are distinct from each other.
Finals aside, their initials are completely different and 95% of the time with phonetic components the initials would be related in some way.
@@vokzaal Hello again and thank you for the comment. (Sorry for the third reply, but the formatting kept being all over the place).
I think the data from phonetic dictionaries I provided tie 其 to 斯 sufficiently in a direct manner, but as I wrote later, there is a lot of indirect evidence too:
祺𤷍蜝錤騏麒鶀 rhymed with 宜
其 also rhymed with 宜
斯 also rhymed with 宜
凘撕澌簛 also rhymed with 宜
If both 其 and 斯 are systematically used as phonetic elements in characters which rhymed with 宜 and both 其 and 斯 also rhymed with 宜 and since 其 is suspected to be the phonetic element in 斯 there is a very high chance 其 really is the phonetic element in 斯
Also, 祺𤷍蜝錤騏麒鶀 and 凘撕澌簛 are a lot of characters. 其 and 斯 were obviously systematically used as phonetic elements in characters that rhymed with 宜。I mention this, because often much less evidence is needed and it all just points to the fact that 其 and 斯 rhymed with 宜 as well.
This is just hard historical data and regardless of whether we have information from 廣韻 or 正韻 it independently proves there is a systematic relation between 其 and 斯 (and a bit lower I will show direct evidence from 廣韻 too).
Moreover we can prove that 斤 is the semantic element in 斯 because 斯 is defined as:
《說文》析也。
《爾雅·釋言》斯，離也。
This shows that 斤 is the semantic element pointing to the original meaning of 斯 'to separate' and what is left, 其 is thus the phonetic element (making this assumption in conjunction with the pronunciation ties I wrote about earlier).
There are characters where all elements of the character seem to have a semantic value only (even though there is a theory that there are no such characters and that all multiple element characters have a phonetic element in them), but there is too much phonetic evidence tying 其 to 斯 for a reasonable assumption that 斯 is a phono-semantic character with 其 being its phonetic element and 斤 its semantic element.
Even though often wrong, even Shuowen says 其 is the phonetic in 斯: 《斤部》斯：析也。从斤其聲。
If you need clear pre 正韻 evidence that 其 and 斯 rhymed, there is clear evidence in 廣韻 itself:
其：《廣韻·上平聲·之·其》
其：《廣韻·上平聲·之·姬》
斯：《廣韻·上平聲·支·斯》
I don't know how much you know about 廣韻 but the 之 and 支 characters indicate the rhyme class 其 and 斯 are in.
If you look here: zh-yue.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E6%94%9D
You can clearly see that 之 and 支 are in the same 止攝 with the -i final. This means that 之 and 支 rhymed in 廣韻 and this means that 其 and 斯 Rhymed in 廣韻 as well.
Of course there is room for error and a margin for interpretation, but what I wrote does tie 其 to 斯 considerably. There are instances where much less evidence is necessary to prove these relations.
Ad Phonetic reconstructions: I'm sure you know that phonetic reconstructions of Old Chinese are imprecise with a lot of room for error (which doesn't mean they are wrong in this case of course). More importantly, they might be completely correct, but they are tracing back the incorrect modern pronunciation.
I'm sure you know that most Chinese characters have several modern pronunciations. Most Chinese characters also have a lot of lost historical pronunciations.
For the sake of example: 會 has two modern pronunciations: hui4 and kuai4 and a rare pronunciation gui4. Apart from this it has a lost historical pronunciation which would lead to the modern huo4. If you only reconstruct the Old Chinese pronunciation of 會 hui4, for example, and nothing else, then you will have a very hard time tying it to the Old Chinese reconstruction of 𨭗 which today is pronounced guo2. This directly leads to my second point:
It is quite difficult sometimes to tell what was one pronunciation 1000 years ago in the time of 廣韻 and 2 pronunciations today and what was two pronunciations 1000 years ago and 2 today. In other words one historical pronunciation might have diverged into two modern pronunciations but if a character has two modern pronunciations today, it doesn't mean that they come from a single original pronunciation. It might have had one original pronunciation acquiring a completely different and unrelated one. In the case of 會 all four pronunciations of the character hui4, kuai4, gui4 and huo4 might come only from one root but they also don't have to. With a lot of research and a lot of data it is possible to have an idea about what happened, but in many cases it's impossible. This is even more valid for Old Chinese reconstructions and I try to keep this in mind when I see historical reconstructions of Old Chinese. I prefer to work with rhyme dictionaries and use Old Chinese reconstructions as a reference only.
Additionally, character pronunciations tend to diverge as time progresses and not converge. In other words:
kuo + (1000 years pass) = 1. kuo and 2. huo
and not
1. kuo and 2. huo + (1000 years pass) = kuo.
I'm saying this because if there was a small difference in the pronunciation of 其 and 斯 in 廣韻 and 說文解字 says 其 is the phonetic in 斯, it is consistent with pronunciation divergence over time, which is another supporting argument that 其 can be the phonetic element in 斯
"Finals aside, their initials are completely different and 95% of the time with phonetic components the initials would be related in some way."
This is an interesting statement. Would you have a study that you could point me to? I don't think the statement is true, but I'm interested in reading about it.
I apologise if what I’m saying is from an uninformed perspective, as I have not used rhyme dictionaries as a source of understanding and may have been greatly misled by reconstructions. However, there are still a few details within your reasoning that I’d like to discuss further, as what I’m seeing in front of me seems quite contradictory.
Firstly, I’d like to know why 支 and 之 have their own classes if both 其 and 斯 are under the 止攝, especially when sub-categories of a 攝 tend to have very different finals. Whether or not their listing indicates similarity, I’d like to point out that 廣韻 was published during the beginning of the 11th century, and 5 centuries had passed since 切韻 which is supposed to represent Middle Chinese (or the first period, while 廣韻 represents the second period) so their final may have merged only by then.
Secondly, I’m a little confused at how you’re addressing reconstructions. Are you suggesting that they are incorrect due to mistakes, or am I not understanding the purpose behind reconstructions and that the linguists behind them have deliberately not told the full story? I’m asking this because nine different linguists have agreed on the distinction between the finals of 之 and 支, and additional pronunciations of characters in Middle Chinese are written when applicable.
Assuming that 之 and 支 did not rhyme in Old Chinese, I acknowledge that 其 could be the phonetic component of 斯 as part of an alternate pronunciation, but until further clarification I don’t think that the qi and si pronunciations are affiliated with each other.
As for my claim on initials, 95% is certainly an overstatement - the true number would be closer to 80-85%. Unfortunately, this statement does not come from any reputable publication, but rather from my own observations and understanding of (modern) Chinese phonetics across Sino-Xenic languages. However, I don’t believe that I’ve come across many phonetic series with both k- and alveolar/alveolo-palatal initials other than l- (from the perspective of Cantonese or Japanese), and the only one I can think of off the top of my head is between 燒 and 澆 (well, the initials of 堯’s characters are ridiculously varying anyway). In any case, phonetic components nearly always take both initials and finals into account very systematically, and having h/g/k and s/ɕ/etc. together is quite rare (again, from what I’ve seen in modern languages).
Ok. I totally love what you do here, but you’ve got to slow it down. You’re assuming most are on your level. Please, simplify and SLOW DOWN!
Hello. This is maybe the 15th lecture in the series. I go very slowly in the first 5 lectures and explain everything in detail. A lot of people thought it was unnecessary to go so slowly in the following lectures since everything was explained in detail in the first couple of ones and I agree. If you want to understand the basic concepts, it is sufficient to watch the first lecture. It is redundant to repeat the basics with every video. Each video would be 30 minutes long.
..or maybe I need to speed up. Anyway, I totally support this work and appreciate it.
Understanding Chinese Characters Are they in progression? (From my viewing experience you jump around). I’ve been following from a point of understanding, and you’ve lost me. It s ok. I’m sorry. Humility is our greatest power.
Thank you. They are in progression. I created a playlist for these videos but not sure hot to share it properly, so hope this link takes you there: th-cam.com/play/PLG2KFyEG82PfbpDNoe9g45Gh6zt04WLuk.html
Hey I checked out your channel if you are a kid or have a kid give a look at Hanzi Gong it is AMAZING.
15:23 as you can si :p
What do you mean?
Understanding Chinese Characters ‘see’ kind of sounds like the ‘si’ in 斯 . It’s a silly joke i know
@@mueezadam8438 :)