[General_Zhaoyun]

I'm always fascinated by how chinese languages evolved. It's kinda interesting to know that the spoken han-language 1000 year ago is different from the Mandarin that we spoke of. Today's Mandarin came from the Modern chinese dating 11th century onwards.

Old chinese - before 800 to 300 BC
Middle chinese - 300 BC to 1100 AD
Modern chinese - 1100 to today

Ever since the past (from Qin dynasty onwards), a chinese often had 2 languages existing: their own mother tongue dialect plus a common language for all chinese. The common language could be the old chinese-language. There were no conflict between these languages. The common language was often used by the imperial court and in the capital. For dialects, it was spoken in a local region and in common daily lifes.

It's kinda interesting to note that out of the 7 major dialects, the north spoke mostly Mandarin, while the 6 other dialects such as Wu, Yue, Min, Kejia, Gan, Xiang are all in the south below Yang Tze river. How were these dialects developed?

I've watched a lecture on TV at Phoenix channel last Saturday by a Professor who talked about the history of chinese dialects. He said that all the 7 major dialects were evolved from the old chinese (before 800 to 300 BC). Due to several mass migration of chinese towards south during history and b'cos of the han-language mixing with that of other indigeneous people in the south, many dialects in the south evolved.


Cantonese
This han dialect was evolved when Qinshihuang sent troops to invade Guangdong province (during Qing dynasty). About 50,000 chinese troops were stationed in Guangdong and they inter-mixed with the indigenous Yue people there, and formed a new dialect language that we called "Cantonese".

Wu
During 3 kingdoms, Wu was one the state in the south-east. There was mass migration of chinese from the north to the region of today's Jiangsu province. Bringing their old han-language and mixing with the indigenous population, they formed the earliest Wu dialect.

Min
Min seemed to be derived from the Wu dialect.

As for other dialect's history and origin, I'm not too sure ..

Any other comments is appreciated.

[nishishei]

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Wu
During 3 kingdoms, Wu was one the state in the south-east. There was mass migration of chinese from the north to the region of today's Jiangsu province. Bringing their old han-language and mixing with the indigenous population, they formed the earliest Wu dialect.

Wu dialects are much older than Three Kingdoms period. In fact their historical development stems directly from the original language spoken in Wu-Yue and Chu Kingdoms during pre-Qin periods. Migrations from the north also occurred throughout Chinese history as early as during the Spring and Autumn period. China never had a unified "Old Han spoken language" before and after the Qin (until 20th century).

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This han dialect was evolved when Qinshihuang sent troops to invade Guangdong province (during Qin dynasty). About 50,000 chinese troops were stationed in Guangdong and they inter-mixed with the indigenous Yue people there, and formed a new dialect language that we called "Cantonese".

The Wu dialects are also most certainly older in Sinitic development than the Cantonese dialects. Wu dialects still contain voiced consonants (a characteristic of an earlier from of Middle Chinese), while Cantonese and Mandarin do not.

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Today's Mandarin came from the Modern chinese dating 11th century onwards.

It's funny you do not mention how Mandarin became what it is today. For sure, there was no Modern Chinese in the 11th century.

[General_Zhaoyun]

Hey.. thanks for the mentioning about the history of Wu dialect. I'm keen in learning more history about chinese dialects.

Anyway, I'm not well-informed about the history of Mandarin. I read it somewhere that today's Mandarin was a result of a combination of the "Modern chinese dating from 11th century" plus some influence from Khitan, Mongolian and Manchu Language as a result of these northern nomad's invasion and conquest of northern China.

If you know more about the history of Mandarin dialect, please let me know

[TongShanThaiHiung]

The Hakka dialect is one of the oldest chinese dialect if not the oldest.It can be traced back to late Shang and early Zhou dynasty.And many language scholars verifies that Hakka dialect is the closest to Central Plains' ancient rhyme.Hakka dialect was spoken by most peasants and farmers at least in Shanxi,Henan and eastern/northeastern Shaanxi region in ancient China before jin dynasty collapse during 4 century a.d. and Hakka people started to migrate southward.

[heyniceboard]

TongShanThaiHiung, on Aug 25 2004, 02:49 PM, said:

The Hakka dialect is one of the oldest chinese dialect if not the oldest.It can be traced back to late Shang and early Zhou dynasty.And many language scholars verifies that Hakka dialect is the closest to Central Plains' ancient rhyme.Hakka dialect was spoken by most peasants and farmers at least in Shanxi,Henan and eastern/northeastern Shaanxi region in ancient China before jin dynasty collapse during 4 century a.d. and Hakka people started to migrate southward.

Hakka cannot be traced to late Shang, as the Yin-Shang Dynasty originated from Eastern China and not of the Central Plains region. The Hakka people also migrated south far later than 4th century, otherwise the established Sinitic Cantonese population wouldn't have called the Hakkas "Guest People." The Hakka language is closer to Mandarin than Cantonese or Middle Chinese, it doesn't have many elements that are found in older forms of Chinese. And it doesn't rhyme that well to Middle Chinese.

[TongShanThaiHiung]

Actually according to the World Hakka Association,Hakka dialect can be traced back to as early as Spring and Autumn period or Warring States era.I don't believe that Hakka dialect originated around or after Song dynasty because some language scholars had already verified that it is closest to ancient rhyme of old central plains.

Maybe Meixian Hakka is closer to Mandarin than Cantonese or middle chinese.It has 6 tones while hakka dialect in some certain areas somewhere between Guangdong and Fujian area only has 5 tones.There are also Hakka dialect that has 7 tones which i think around eastern Guangdong.

Those Hakka dialect have many different elements compared to the standard Hakka which people from Meixian speak.By the way,my grandfather speak rather different Hakka compared to my other relative because of his northern origin.The one that he spoke was somehow close to the few ten thousands Hakka people living in Shanxi region today.Perhaps of the Jin dialect influence.But my grandfather was from Hebei province.

[chuck228]

TongShanThaiHiung, on Aug 25 2004, 08:49 AM, said:

The Hakka dialect is one of the oldest chinese dialect if not the oldest.It can be traced back to late Shang and early Zhou dynasty.And many language scholars verifies that Hakka dialect is the closest to Central Plains' ancient rhyme.Hakka dialect was spoken by most peasants and farmers at least in Shanxi,Henan and eastern/northeastern Shaanxi region in ancient China before jin dynasty collapse during 4 century a.d. and Hakka people started to migrate southward.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I watched a documentary about Shaolin temple (in Henan), and one of the senior warrior monk was explaining some moves to his disciples, he is speaking mandarin of course. But what was interesting to me, I heard him say " an niung " to mean "like this/ in this manner", which I always thought was a hakka expression. Is there shared similarities between the speech in Henan and Hakka? given the historical roots mentioned?

[Lianbang Diaocha Ju]

General_Zhaoyun, on Aug 25 2004, 02:36 AM, said:

I'm always fascinated by how chinese languages evolved. It's kinda interesting to know that the spoken han-language 1000 year ago is different from the Mandarin that we spoke of. Today's Mandarin came from the Modern chinese dating 11th century onwards.

Old chinese  - before 800 to 300 BC
Middle chinese - 300 BC to 1100 AD
Modern chinese - 1100 to today

Ever since the past (from Qin dynasty onwards), a chinese often had 2 languages existing: their own mother tongue dialect plus a common language for all chinese. The common language could be the old chinese-language.  There were no conflict between these languages. The common language was often used by the imperial court and in the capital. For dialects, it was spoken in a local region and in common daily lifes.

It's kinda interesting to note that out of the 7 major dialects, the north spoke mostly Mandarin, while the 6 other dialects such as Wu, Yue, Min, Kejia, Gan, Xiang are all in the south below Yang Tze river. How were these dialects developed?

I've watched a lecture on TV at Phoenix channel last Saturday by a Professor who talked about the history of chinese dialects. He said that all the 7 major dialects were evolved from the old chinese (before 800 to 300 BC). Due to several mass migration of chinese towards south during history and b'cos of the han-language mixing with that of other indigeneous people in the south, many dialects in the south evolved.
Cantonese
This han dialect was evolved when Qinshihuang sent troops to invade Guangdong province (during Qing dynasty). About 50,000 chinese troops were stationed in Guangdong and they inter-mixed with the indigenous Yue people there, and formed a new dialect language that we called "Cantonese".

Wu
During 3 kingdoms, Wu was one the state in the south-east. There was mass migration of chinese from the north to the region of today's Jiangsu province. Bringing their old han-language and mixing with the indigenous population, they formed the earliest Wu dialect.

Min
Min seemed to be derived from the Wu dialect.

As for other dialect's history and origin, I'm not too sure ..

Any other comments is appreciated.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

well i suppose it is interesting. but i wonder how different languages itself evolve into entirely differently ones?

for example, english originally came from the present day country of england. then they colonized north america and those colonies formed together as one and became independant. but they still spoke english and still do today. though the english of the british and the americans is not entirely the same, we know we speak english and can understand each other. and i'm sure taiwanese,mainland chinese, and singaporeans,live away from each other, but i'm sure they can understand one another as they speak the same language.

did it take a really long time for these new dialects to be formed from one language?

ciao!

[nishishei]

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did it take a really long time for these new dialects to be formed from one language?

Well we can also see how Latin has become French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, etc. Like the Romance languages, the Chinese languages started developing differently by also mixing with indigenous languages. For example French is basically Latin with heavy Gaelic and Germanic influences, very very very few French today speak the ancient Celtic language, but it has left a mark on the Latin-derived French language today. Since the Chinese didn't have a phonetic script and only the Chinese officials kept records, indigenous languages are not very well known. To call the Sinitic languages "dialects" is a huge misnomer only popularized in the 20th century. Before 1900's, the Chinese word 方言 fangyan, didn't mean dialects, but languages in general (roughly: 地方语言). The Qing government even called English a 方言 fangyan.