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Tangutology
Tangutology or Tangut studies is the study of the culture, history, art and language of the ancient Tangut people, especially as seen through the study of contemporaneous documents written by the Tangut people themselves. As the Tangut language was written in a unique and complex script and the spoken language became extinct, the cornerstone of Tangut studies has been the study of the Tangut language and the decipherment of the Tangut script. The Tangut people founded the Western Xia dynasty (1038–1227) in northwestern China, which was eventually overthrown by the Mongols. The Tangut script, which was devised in 1036, was widely used in printed books and on monumental inscriptions during the Western Xia period, as well as during the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368), but the language became extinct sometime during the Ming dynasty (1368–1644). The latest known examples of Tangut writing are Buddhist inscriptions dated 1502 on two dharani pillars from a temple in Baoding, Hebei. By ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Liangzhou Stele
Tangutology or Tangut studies is the study of the culture, history, art and language of the ancient Tangut people, especially as seen through the study of contemporaneous documents written by the Tangut people themselves. As the Tangut language was written in a unique and complex script and the spoken language became extinct, the cornerstone of Tangut studies has been the study of the Tangut language and the decipherment of the Tangut script. The Tangut people founded the Western Xia dynasty (1038–1227) in northwestern China, which was eventually overthrown by the Mongols. The Tangut script, which was devised in 1036, was widely used in printed books and on monumental inscriptions during the Western Xia period, as well as during the Yuan dynasty (1271–1368), but the language became extinct sometime during the Ming dynasty (1368–1644). The latest known examples of Tangut writing are Buddhist inscriptions dated 1502 on two dharani pillars from a temple in Baoding, Hebei. By th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tangut Script
The Tangut script ( Tangut: ; ) was a logographic writing system, used for writing the extinct Tangut language of the Western Xia dynasty. According to the latest count, 5863 Tangut characters are known, excluding variants. The Tangut characters are similar in appearance to Chinese characters, with the same type of strokes, but the methods of forming characters in the Tangut writing system are significantly different from those of forming Chinese characters. As in Chinese calligraphy, regular, running, cursive and seal scripts were used in Tangut writing. History According to the ''History of Song'' (1346), the script was designed by the high-ranking official Yeli Renrong in 1036. The script was invented in a short period of time, and was put into use quickly. Government schools were founded to teach the script. Official documents were written in the script (with diplomatic ones written bilingually). A great number of Buddhist scriptures were translated from Tibetan and Chin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tangut Language
Tangut (Tangut: ; ) is an extinct language in the Sino-Tibetan language family. Tangut was one of the official languages of the Western Xia dynasty, founded by the Tangut people in northwestern China. The Western Xia was annihilated by the Mongol Empire in 1227. The Tangut language has its own script, the Tangut script. The latest known text written in the Tangut language, the Tangut dharani pillars, dates to 1502, suggesting that the language was still in use nearly three hundred years after the collapse of Western Xia. Classification Since the 2010s, more Tangutologists have classified Tangut as a Qiangic and/or Gyalrongic language. On the basis of both morphological and lexical evidence, Lai et al. (2020) classify Tangut as a West Gyalrongic language. Rediscovery Modern research into the Tangut languages began in the late 19th century and early 20th century when S. W. Bushell, Gabriel Devéria, and Georges Morisse separately published decipherments of a number of Tang ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cloud Platform At Juyongguan
The Cloud Platform at Juyongguan () is a mid-14th-century architectural feature situated in the Guangou Valley at the Juyongguan Pass of the Great Wall of China, in the Changping District of Beijing Municipality, about northwest of central Beijing. Although the structure looks like a gateway, it was originally the base for three white dagobas or stupas, with a passage through it, a type of structure known as a "crossing street tower" (). The platform is renowned for its Buddhist carvings and for its Buddhist inscriptions in six languages. The Cloud Platform was the 98th site included in the first batch of 180 Major Historical and Cultural Sites Protected at the National Level as designated by the State Council of China in April 1961. History The platform was built between 1342 and 1345, during the reign of Emperor Huizong of the Yuan Dynasty, by imperial command. It was part of the Buddhist Yongming Baoxiang Temple (), which was situated at the Juyongguan Pass northwes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Western Xia
The Western Xia or the Xi Xia (), officially the Great Xia (), also known as the Tangut Empire, and known as ''Mi-nyak''Stein (1972), pp. 70–71. to the Tanguts and Tibetans, was a Tangut-led Buddhist imperial dynasty of China that existed from 1038 to 1227. At its peak, the dynasty ruled over the modern-day northwestern Chinese provinces of Ningxia, Gansu, eastern Qinghai, northern Shaanxi, northeastern Xinjiang, and southwest Inner Mongolia, and southernmost Outer Mongolia, measuring about . Its capital was Xingqing (modern Yinchuan), until its destruction by the Mongols in 1227. Most of its written records and architecture were destroyed, so the founders and history of the empire remained obscure until 20th-century research in China and the West. The Western Xia occupied the area around the Hexi Corridor, a stretch of the Silk Road, the most important trade route between northern China and Central Asia. They made significant achievements in literature, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gabriel Devéria
Jean-Gabriel Devéria (8 March 1844 – 12 July 1899), known as Gabriel Devéria, was a French diplomat and interpreter who worked for the French diplomatic service in China from the age of sixteen. He was also a noted sinologist and pioneer Tangutologist who published one of the first studies of the Tangut script in 1898. Biography Devéria was born in Paris on 8 March 1844 to a family of artists. His father was Achille Devéria (1800–1857), a renowned painter and lithographer, and his uncle was the Romantic painter Eugène Devéria (1805–1865). His mother Céleste, who married his father in 1829, was the daughter of a lithographic printer, Charles-Etienne Motte (1785–1836). He was one of six children, including Théodule Devéria (1831–1871), who became a photographer and Egyptologist. After the death of his father in 1857, when he only thirteen years old, his older brother Théodule took responsibility for his education. In February 1860, aged only sixteen, Gabriel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tibetan Script
The Tibetan script is a segmental writing system (''abugida'') of Brahmic scripts, Indic origin used to write certain Tibetic languages, including Lhasa Tibetan, Tibetan, Dzongkha, Sikkimese language, Sikkimese, Ladakhi language, Ladakhi, Jirel language, Jirel and Balti language, Balti. It has also been used for some non-Tibetic languages in close cultural contact with Tibet, such as Thakali language, Thakali. The printed form is called uchen script while the hand-written cursive form used in everyday writing is called umê script. This writing system is used across the Himalayas, and Tibet. The script is closely linked to a broad ethnic Tibetan identity, spanning across areas in India, Nepal, Bhutan and Tibet. The Tibetan script is of Brahmic scripts, Brahmic origin from the Gupta script and is ancestral to scripts such as Meitei script, Meitei, Lepcha script, Lepcha,Daniels, Peter T. and William Bright. ''The World's Writing Systems''. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Character
Chinese characters () are logograms developed for the writing of Chinese. In addition, they have been adapted to write other East Asian languages, and remain a key component of the Japanese writing system where they are known as '' kanji''. Chinese characters in South Korea, which are known as '' hanja'', retain significant use in Korean academia to study its documents, history, literature and records. Vietnam once used the ''chữ Hán'' and developed chữ Nôm to write Vietnamese before turning to a romanized alphabet. Chinese characters are the oldest continuously used system of writing in the world. By virtue of their widespread current use throughout East Asia and Southeast Asia, as well as their profound historic use throughout the Sinosphere, Chinese characters are among the most widely adopted writing systems in the world by number of users. The total number of Chinese characters ever to appear in a dictionary is in the tens of thousands, though most are g ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lanydza Script
The Rañjanā script (Lantsa) is an abugida writing system which developed in the 11th centuryJwajalapa and until the mid-20th century was used in an area from Nepal to Tibet by the , the historic inhabitants of the , to write and . Nowadays it is also used in Buddhist monasteries in India; |
ʼPhags-pa Script
The Phags-pa script is an alphabet designed by the Tibetan monk and State Preceptor (later Imperial Preceptor) Drogön Chögyal Phagpa for Kublai Khan, the founder of the Yuan dynasty, as a unified script for the written languages within the Yuan. The actual use of this script was limited to about a hundred years during the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty, and it fell out of use with the advent of the Ming dynasty. It was used to write and transcribe varieties of Chinese, the Tibetic languages, Mongolian, the Uyghur language, Sanskrit, Persian, and other neighboring languages during the Yuan era. For historical linguists, the documentation of its use provides clues about the changes in these languages. Its descendant systems include Horizontal square script, used to write Tibetan and Sanskrit. There is a theory that the Korean Hangul alphabet had a limited influence from Phags-pa (see Origin of Hangul). During the Pax Mongolica the script has even made numerous appearances in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tangut People
The Tangut people ( Tangut: , ''mjɨ nja̱'' or , ''mji dzjwo''; ; ; mn, Тангуд) were a Tibeto-Burman tribal union that founded and inhabited the Western Xia dynasty. The group initially lived under Tuyuhun authority, but later submitted to the Tang dynasty, prior to their establishment of the Western Xia. They spoke the Tangut language, which was previously believed to be one of the Qiangic languages or Yi languages that belong to the Tibeto-Burman family. Phylogenetic and historical linguistic accounts, however, reveal that Tangut belonged to the Gyalrongic languages. Language The Tangut language, otherwise known as ''Fan'', belongs to the Tibeto-Burman branch of the Sino-Tibetan language family. Like many other Sino-Tibetan languages, it is a tonal language with predominantly mono-syllabic roots, but it shares certain grammatical traits central to the Tibeto-Burman branch. It is still debated as to whether Tangut belongs to the Yi or Qiangic subdivision of Tibeto- ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Old Uyghur Alphabet
The Old Uyghur alphabet was a Turkic script used for writing the Old Uyghur, a variety of Old Turkic spoken in Turpan and Gansu that is the ancestor of the modern Western Yugur language. The term "Old Uyghur" used for this alphabet is misleading because Qocho, the Uyghur (Yugur) kingdom created in 843, originally used the Old Turkic alphabet. The Uyghur adopted this "Old Uyghur" script from local inhabitants when they migrated into Turfan after 840. It was an adaptation of the Aramaic alphabet used for texts with Buddhist, Manichaean and Christian content for 700–800 years in Turpan. The last known manuscripts are dated to the 18th century. This was the prototype for the Mongolian and Manchu alphabets. The Old Uyghur alphabet was brought to Mongolia by Tata-tonga. The Old Uyghur script was used between the 8th and 17th centuries primarily in the Tarim Basin of Central Asia, located in present-day Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region, China. It is a cursive-joining alphabet wi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
