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Xiao Erya
The ''Xiao Erya'' (; "Little ra") was an early Chinese dictionary that supplements the ''Erya''. It was supposedly compiled in the early Han Dynasty by Kong Fu ( 264?-208 BCE), a descendant of Confucius. However, the received ''Xiao Erya'' text was included in a Confucianist collection of debates, the ''Kongcongzi'' (; ''K'ung-ts'ung-tzu''; "The Kong Family Master's Anthology"), which contains fabrications that its first editor Wang Su (, 195-256 CE) added to win his arguments with Zheng Xuan (, 127-200CE). The Qing Dynasty scholar Hu Chenggong (, 1776–1832), who wrote the ''Xiao Erya yizheng'' ( "Exegesis and Proof for the ''Xiao Erya''"), accepted Kong Fu as the author. Liu concludes the ''Xiao Erya'' reliably dates from the Western Han Dynasty and suggests its compiler was from the southern state of Chu. The ''Xiao Erya'' has 374 entries, far less than the ''Erya'' with 2091. It simplifies the ''Eryas 19 semantically-based chapter divisions into 13, and entitles them with ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Dictionary
Chinese dictionaries date back over two millennia to the Han dynasty, which is a significantly longer lexicographical history than any other language. There are hundreds of dictionaries for the Chinese language, and this article discusses some of the most important. Terminology The general term ''císhū'' (, "lexicographic books") semantically encompasses "dictionary; lexicon; encyclopedia; glossary". The Chinese language has two words for dictionary: ''zidian'' (character/logograph dictionary) for written forms, that is, Chinese characters, and ''cidian'' (word/phrase dictionary), for spoken forms. For character dictionaries, ''zidian'' () combines ''zi'' "character, graph; letter, script, writing; word") and ''dian'' "dictionary, encyclopedia; standard, rule; statute, canon; classical allusion"). For word dictionaries, ''cidian'' is interchangeably written /; ''cídiǎn''; ''tzʻŭ²-tien³''; "word dictionary") or (/; ''cídiǎn''; ''tzʻŭ²-tien³''; "word dictionary"); ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Erya
The ''Erya'' or ''Erh-ya'' is the first surviving Chinese dictionary. Bernhard Karlgren (1931:49) concluded that "the major part of its glosses must reasonably date from the 3rd century BC." Title Chinese scholars interpret the first title character ''ěr'' (; "you, your; adverbial suffix") as a phonetic loan character for the homophonous ''ěr'' (; "near; close; approach"), and believe the second ''yǎ'' (; "proper; correct; refined; elegant") refers to words or language.''Shiming (Explanations of Names)'"Explaining the Classics" versio [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Han Dynasty
The Han dynasty (, ; ) was an imperial dynasty of China (202 BC – 9 AD, 25–220 AD), established by Liu Bang (Emperor Gao) and ruled by the House of Liu. The dynasty was preceded by the short-lived Qin dynasty (221–207 BC) and a warring interregnum known as the ChuHan contention (206–202 BC), and it was succeeded by the Three Kingdoms period (220–280 AD). The dynasty was briefly interrupted by the Xin dynasty (9–23 AD) established by usurping regent Wang Mang, and is thus separated into two periods—the Western Han (202 BC – 9 AD) and the Eastern Han (25–220 AD). Spanning over four centuries, the Han dynasty is considered a golden age in Chinese history, and it has influenced the identity of the Chinese civilization ever since. Modern China's majority ethnic group refers to themselves as the "Han people", the Sinitic language is known as "Han language", and the written Chinese is referred to as "Han characters". The emperor was at the pinnacle of ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Confucius
Confucius ( ; zh, s=, p=Kǒng Fūzǐ, "Master Kǒng"; or commonly zh, s=, p=Kǒngzǐ, labels=no; – ) was a Chinese philosopher and politician of the Spring and Autumn period who is traditionally considered the paragon of Chinese sages. Confucius's teachings and philosophy underpin East Asian culture and society, remaining influential across China and East Asia to this day. Confucius considered himself a transmitter for the values of earlier periods which he claimed had been abandoned in his time. His philosophical teachings, called Confucianism, emphasized personal and governmental morality, correctness of social relationships, justice, kindness, and sincerity. His followers competed with many other schools during the Hundred Schools of Thought era, only to be suppressed in favor of the Legalists during the Qin dynasty. After the collapse of Qin and the victory of Han over Chu, Confucius's thoughts received official sanction in the new government. During the Tan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Confucianist
Confucianism, also known as Ruism or Ru classicism, is a system of thought and behavior originating in ancient China. Variously described as tradition, a philosophy, a religion, a humanistic or rationalistic religion, a way of governing, or a way of life, Confucianism developed from what was later called the Hundred Schools of Thought from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius (551–479 BCE). Confucius considered himself a transmitter of cultural values inherited from the Xia (c. 2070–1600 BCE), Shang (c. 1600–1046 BCE) and Western Zhou dynasties (c. 1046–771 BCE). Confucianism was suppressed during the Legalist and autocratic Qin dynasty (221–206 BCE), but survived. During the Han dynasty (206 BCE–220 CE), Confucian approaches edged out the "proto-Taoist" Huang–Lao as the official ideology, while the emperors mixed both with the realist techniques of Legalism. A Confucian revival began during the Tang dynasty (618–907 CE). In the late Tang, Co ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wang Su (Cao Wei)
Wang Su (195–256), courtesy name Ziyong, was an official and Confucian scholar of the state of Cao Wei during the Three Kingdoms period of China. He was a son of Wang Lang. When Guanqiu Jian started a rebellion in Shouchun, Wang Su advised Sima Shi to lower the rebels' morale by treating their families with respect. Following that, Wang Su entreated Cao Mao to allow Sima Zhao to succeed Sima Shi as regent of Wei. Wang Su's daughter, Wang Yuanji, married Sima Zhao and gave birth to Sima Yan, the first emperor of the Jin dynasty (266–420), thus Wang Su became a grandfather himself. Wang Su inherited the title and marquisate of Marquis of Lanling () from his father.''Jin Shu'' vol. 31. Wang Su compiled the extant edition of the ''Kongzi Jiayu'' (''School Sayings of Confucius''), the sayings of Confucius not included in the ''Analects''. Scholars long suspected it was a forgery by Wang Su, but a book discovered in 1977 from the Shuanggudui tomb (sealed in 165 BCE), entitled ''R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zheng Xuan
Zheng Xuan (127– July 200), courtesy name Kangcheng (), was a Chinese philosopher, politician, and writer near the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty. He was born in Gaomi, Beihai Commandery (modern Weifang, Shandong), and was a student of Ma Rong, together with Lu Zhi. Like his teacher, he was a member of the Old Text School that was challenging the state orthodox New Text School. His contemporary rival was He Xiu (, 129-182). Zheng is notable for his syncretic attempt to bridge the two centuries of rivalry between the two schools. He adopted the strengths of each school in the interpretation of the Confucian classics although he usually favored the Old Text teachings. He was very influential but the government never officially adopted his teachings. The Han Dynasty was already in decline during his lifetime and collapsed a generation after his death. Both schools did not survive the chaos but Zheng's conception of Confucianism would be the mainstream interpretation for ce ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Qing Dynasty
The Qing dynasty ( ), officially the Great Qing,, was a Manchu-led imperial dynasty of China and the last orthodox dynasty in Chinese history. It emerged from the Later Jin dynasty founded by the Jianzhou Jurchens, a Tungusic-speaking ethnic group who unified other Jurchen tribes to form a new "Manchu" ethnic identity. The dynasty was officially proclaimed in 1636 in Manchuria (modern-day Northeast China and Outer Manchuria). It seized control of Beijing in 1644, then later expanded its rule over the whole of China proper and Taiwan, and finally expanded into Inner Asia. The dynasty lasted until 1912 when it was overthrown in the Xinhai Revolution. In orthodox Chinese historiography, the Qing dynasty was preceded by the Ming dynasty and succeeded by the Republic of China. The multiethnic Qing dynasty lasted for almost three centuries and assembled the territorial base for modern China. It was the largest imperial dynasty in the history of China and in 1790 the f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chu (state)
Chu, or Ch'u in Wade–Giles romanization, (, Hanyu Pinyin: Chǔ, Old Chinese: ''*s-r̥aʔ'') was a Zhou dynasty vassal state. Their first ruler was King Wu of Chu in the early 8th century BCE. Chu was located in the south of the Zhou heartland and lasted during the Spring and Autumn period. At the end of the Warring States period it was destroyed by the Qin in 223 BCE during the Qin's wars of unification. Also known as Jing () and Jingchu (), Chu included most of the present-day provinces of Hubei and Hunan, along with parts of Chongqing, Guizhou, Henan, Anhui, Jiangxi, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Shanghai. For more than 400 years, the Chu capital Danyang was located at the junction of the Dan and Xi Rivers near present-day Xichuan County, Henan, but later moved to Ying. The house of Chu originally bore the clan name Nai ( OC: /*rneːlʔ/) which was later written as Mi ( OC: /*meʔ/). They also bore the lineage name Yan ( OC: /*qlamʔ/, /*qʰɯːm/) which would later ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chinese Language
Chinese (, especially when referring to written Chinese) is a group of languages spoken natively by the ethnic Han Chinese majority and many minority ethnic groups in Greater China. About 1.3 billion people (or approximately 16% of the world's population) speak a variety of Chinese as their first language. Chinese languages form the Sinitic branch of the Sino-Tibetan languages family. The spoken varieties of Chinese are usually considered by native speakers to be variants of a single language. However, their lack of mutual intelligibility means they are sometimes considered separate languages in a family. Investigation of the historical relationships among the varieties of Chinese is ongoing. Currently, most classifications posit 7 to 13 main regional groups based on phonetic developments from Middle Chinese, of which the most spoken by far is Mandarin (with about 800 million speakers, or 66%), followed by Min (75 million, e.g. Southern Min), Wu (74 million, e.g. Shangh ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pinyin
Hanyu Pinyin (), often shortened to just pinyin, is the official romanization system for Standard Mandarin Chinese in China, and to some extent, in Singapore and Malaysia. It is often used to teach Mandarin, normally written in Chinese form, to learners already familiar with the Latin alphabet. The system includes four diacritics denoting tones, but pinyin without tone marks is used to spell Chinese names and words in languages written in the Latin script, and is also used in certain computer input methods to enter Chinese characters. The word ' () literally means "Han language" (i.e. Chinese language), while ' () means "spelled sounds". The pinyin system was developed in the 1950s by a group of Chinese linguists including Zhou Youguang and was based on earlier forms of romanizations of Chinese. It was published by the Chinese Government in 1958 and revised several times. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) adopted pinyin as an international standard ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shiming
The ''Shiming'' (), also known as the ''Yìyǎ'' (逸雅; ''I-ya''; ''Lost Erya''), is a Chinese dictionary that employed phonological glosses, and "is believed to date from ''c''. 200 E. This dictionary is linguistically invaluable because it records the pronunciation of an Eastern Han Chinese dialect. Sinologists have used their data to approximate the dates of phonological changes, such as the loss of consonant clusters which took place between Old Chinese and Middle Chinese. Format The 1,502 definitions attempt to establish semantic connections based upon puns between the word being defined and the word defining it, which is often followed with an explanation. For instance (chapter 12: 愛哀也愛乃思念之也), "Love (''ài'' 愛 "love; like; be fond of") is sorrow (''āi'' "哀 sorrow; grief; lament"). If you love, then you remember fondly." The Chinese call these paronomastic glosses '' yīnxùn'' (音訓; ''yin-hsün''; "sound teaching"), meaning "to use the pronuncia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
