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Shuowen Jiezi
The ''Shuowen Jiezi'' is a Chinese dictionary compiled by Xu Shen , during the Eastern Han dynasty (25–220 CE). While prefigured by earlier reference works for Chinese characters like the ''Erya'' (), the ''Shuowen Jiezi'' contains the first comprehensive analysis of characters in terms of their structure, where Xu attempted to provide rationales for their construction. It was also the first to organize its entries into sections according to shared components called Chinese character radicals, radicals. Background Xu Shen was a scholar of the Five Classics during the Han dynasty. He finished compiling the ''Shuowen Jiezi'' in 100 CE. However, due to an unfavorable imperial attitude towards scholarship, he waited until 121 before his son Xu Chong presented it to Emperor An of Han, along with a memorial. In analyzing the structure of characters and defining the words represented by them, Xu strove to clarify the meaning of the pre-Han classics, so as to ensure order and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Song Dynasty
The Song dynasty ( ) was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 960 to 1279. The dynasty was founded by Emperor Taizu of Song, who usurped the throne of the Later Zhou dynasty and went on to conquer the rest of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period#Ten Kingdoms, Ten Kingdoms, ending the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period. The Song frequently came into conflict with the contemporaneous Liao dynasty, Liao, Western Xia and Jin dynasty (1115–1234), Jin dynasties in northern China. After retreating to southern China following attacks by the Jin dynasty, the Song was eventually conquered by the Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The History of the Song dynasty, dynasty's history is divided into two periods: during the Northern Song (; 960–1127), the capital was in the northern city of Bianjing (now Kaifeng) and the dynasty controlled most of what is now East China. The #Southern Song, 1127–1279, Southern Song (; 1127–1279) comprise the period following ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Semantic
Semantics is the study of linguistic Meaning (philosophy), meaning. It examines what meaning is, how words get their meaning, and how the meaning of a complex expression depends on its parts. Part of this process involves the distinction between sense and reference. Sense is given by the ideas and concepts associated with an expression while reference is the object to which an expression points. Semantics contrasts with syntax, which studies the rules that dictate how to create grammatically correct sentences, and pragmatics, which investigates how people use language in communication. Lexical semantics is the branch of semantics that studies word meaning. It examines whether words have one or several meanings and in what lexical relations they stand to one another. Phrasal semantics studies the meaning of sentences by exploring the phenomenon of compositionality or how new meanings can be created by arranging words. Formal semantics (natural language), Formal semantics relies o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Qiu Xigui
Qiu Xigui (; (13 July 1935 – 8 May 2025) was a Chinese historian, palaeographer, and professor of Fudan University. His book ''Chinese Writing'' is considered the "single most influential study of Chinese palaeography". Early life and education Qiu Xigui was born in July 1935 in Shanghai, of Ningbo ancestry. In 1952, he was admitted to the history department of Fudan University and was interested in pre- Qin dynasty Chinese history. Under the influence of the renowned oracle bone expert Hu Houxuan, he took interest in the oracle bones and Chinese bronze inscriptions. After graduating in 1956, he became a graduate student of oracle bones and Shang dynasty history, studying under Professor Hu. The same year, Hu was transferred to the Institute of History of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, and Qiu followed Hu to the institute. Career After finishing his graduate studies in 1960, Qiu was assigned to be a teaching assistant in the Department of Chinese of Peking Un ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wang Guowei
Wang Guowei (; 2 December 18772 June 1927) or Wang Kuo-wei, courtesy name Jing'an () or Boyu (), was a Chinese historian and poet. A versatile scholar, he made important contributions to the studies of ancient history, epigraphy, philology, vernacular literature and literary theory. Biography A native of Haining, Zhejiang, he went to Shanghai to work as a proofreader for a newspaper, after failing to pass the Imperial Examination in his hometown, at the age of 22. There he studied in the Dongwen Xueshe (東文學社), a Japanese language teaching school, and became a protégé of Luo Zhenyu. Sponsored by Luo, he left for Japan in 1901, studying natural sciences in Tokyo. Back in China one year later, he began to teach in different colleges, and devoted himself to the study of German idealism. He fled to Japan with Luo when the Xinhai Revolution took place in 1911. He returned to China in 1916, but remained loyal to the overthrown Manchu emperor. In 1924, he was appointed profe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
King Xuan Of Zhou
__NOTOC__ King Xuan of Zhou, personal name Ji Jing, was king of the Chinese Zhou dynasty; his reign has been reconstructed to be 827/25782 BC. He worked to restore royal authority after the Gonghe Regency. He fought the "Western Barbarians" (probably Xianyun) and another group on the Huai River to the southeast. In the ninth year of his reign, he called a meeting of all the lords. Later he intervened militarily in succession struggles in the states of Lu (state), Lu, Wey (state), Wey and Qi (state), Qi. Sima Qian said "from this time on, the many lords mostly rebelled against royal commands." According to Zhang Shoujie's annotation ''Correct Meanings'' () to Sima's ''Shiji'', quote: King Xuan is said to have killed the innocent Du Bo and according to tradition was himself killed by an arrow fired by Du Bo's ghost. His son King You of Zhou, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shizhoupian
The ''Shizhoupian'' () is the first known Chinese dictionary, and was written in the ancient large seal script. The work was traditionally dated to the reign of King Xuan of Zhou (827–782 BCE), but many modern scholars assign it to the state of Qin in the Warring States period (221 BCE). The text is no longer fully extant, and it is now known only through fragments. History The ''Shizhoupian'' dictionary, which was probably compiled sometime between 700 BCE to 200 BCE, originally consisted of 15 chapters ( ), but six were lost by the reign of Emperor Guangwu of Han (25–56 CE) and the other nine chapters, except for scattered references, were lost by the Jin dynasty (266–420). Title Until recently, it was thought that the dictionary title referred to Shi Zhou (, who allegedly served as Grand Historian in the court of Western Zhou King Xuan (r. 827–782 BCE). Both the " Yiwenzhi" chapter of the ''Book of Han'' and the 121 CE ''Shuowen Jiez ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zhou Dynasty
The Zhou dynasty ( ) was a royal dynasty of China that existed for 789 years from until 256 BC, the longest span of any dynasty in Chinese history. During the Western Zhou period (771 BC), the royal house, surnamed Ji, had military control over territories centered on the Wei River valley and North China Plain. Even as Zhou suzerainty became increasingly ceremonial over the following Eastern Zhou period (771–256 BC), the political system created by the Zhou royal house survived in some form for several additional centuries. A date of 1046 BC for the Zhou's establishment is supported by the Xia–Shang–Zhou Chronology Project and David Pankenier, but David Nivison and Edward L. Shaughnessy date the establishment to 1045 BC. The latter Eastern Zhou period is itself roughly subdivided into two parts. During the Spring and Autumn period (), power became increasingly decentralized as the authority of the royal house diminished. The Warring States ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Homophone
A homophone () is a word that is pronounced the same as another word but differs in meaning or in spelling. The two words may be spelled the same, for example ''rose'' (flower) and ''rose'' (past tense of "rise"), or spelled differently, as in ''rain'', ''reign'', and ''rein''. The term ''homophone'' sometimes applies to units longer or shorter than words, for example a phrase, letter, or groups of letters which are pronounced the same as a counterpart. Any unit with this property is said to be ''homophonous'' (). Homophones that are spelled the same are both homographs and homonyms. For example, the word ''read'', in "He is well ''read''" and in "Yesterday, I ''read'' that book". Homophones that are spelled differently are also called heterographs, e.g. ''to'', ''too'', and ''two''. Wordplay and games Homophones are often used to create puns and to deceive the reader (as in crossword puzzles) or to suggest multiple meanings. The last usage is common in poetry and creat ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shiming
The ''Shiming'', also known as the ''Yiya'', is a Chinese dictionary that employed phonological glosses, and is believed have been composed . Because it records the pronunciation of an Eastern Han Chinese dialect, sinologists have used the ''Shiming'' to estimate the dates of sound shifts, such as the loss of consonant clusters that took place between the Old Chinese and Middle Chinese stages. 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 example, chapter 12 contains: The Chinese call these paronomastic glosses '' shengxun'' 'sound teaching', which goes back to the Rectification of Names, which hypothesized a connection between names and reality. The ''Shiming'' preface explains this ancient Chinese theory of language. In the correspondence of name with reality, there is in each instance that which is right and proper. The comm ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shengxun
In classical Chinese philology, ''shengxun'' () or ''yinxun'' () is a practice found in Chinese dictionaries where characters are explained by use of a homophone or near-homophone. The practice is ancient, and is present in texts predating the Qin dynasty (221–206 BC). The ancient ''Shiming'' () dictionary is notable for using ''shengxun'' for most of its definitions, and the highly influential ''Shuowen Jiezi'' compiled by Xu Shen also employs the technique. For example, Xu's explanation of the word is: The words for 'ghost' and 'return' are near-homophones both in Xu's reading and in modern Standard Chinese. A similar explanation of the word can be found in the earlier '' Erya'' (). ''Shengxun'' can be highly fanciful, and often results in folk etymology. Put another way, the practice points to a notion of , or what Bernhard Karlgren called "word families". See also * Rebus A rebus ( ) is a puzzle device that combines the use of illustrated pictures with ind ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Synonym
A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means precisely or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all synonyms of one another: they are ''synonymous''. The standard test for synonymy is substitution: one form can be replaced by another in a sentence without changing its meaning. Words may often be synonymous in only one particular sense: for example, ''long'' and ''extended'' in the context ''long time'' or ''extended time'' are synonymous, but ''long'' cannot be used in the phrase ''extended family''. Synonyms with exactly the same meaning share a seme or denotational sememe, whereas those with inexactly similar meanings share a broader denotational or connotational sememe and thus overlap within a semantic field. The former are sometimes called cognitive synonyms and the latter, near-synonyms, plesionyms or poecilonyms. Lexic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
