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The ''Xinhua Zidian'' (), also as ''Xinhua Dictionary'', is a
Chinese-language Chinese ( or ) is a group of languages spoken natively by the ethnic Han Chinese majority and List of ethnic groups in China, many minority ethnic groups in China, as well as by various communities of the Chinese diaspora. Approximately 1.39& ...
dictionary published by the
Commercial Press The Commercial Press () is the first modern publishing organization in China. The Commercial Press is known for its academic publishing and translation work in humanities and social sciences, as well as the '' Xinhua Dictionary''. History In ...
. The first edition of ''Xinhua Zidian'' was published in 1957. The latest version is the 12th edition, which was published in August 2020. It is the best-selling
Chinese dictionary There are two types of dictionaries regularly used in the Chinese language: list individual Chinese characters, and list words and phrases. Because tens of thousands of characters have been used in written Chinese, Chinese lexicographers have d ...
and the world's most popular
reference work A reference work is a document, such as a Academic publishing#Scholarly paper, paper, book or periodical literature, periodical (or their electronic publishing, electronic equivalents), to which one can refer for information. The information ...
. In 2016,
Guinness World Records ''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a British reference book published annually, list ...
officially confirmed that the dictionary, published by The Commercial Press, is the "Most popular dictionary" and the "Best-selling book (regularly updated)". It is considered a symbol of Chinese culture. This pocket-sized dictionary of
Chinese characters Chinese characters are logographs used Written Chinese, to write the Chinese languages and others from regions historically influenced by Chinese culture. Of the four independently invented writing systems accepted by scholars, they represe ...
uses
simplified Chinese characters Simplified Chinese characters are one of two standardized Chinese characters, character sets widely used to write the Chinese language, with the other being traditional characters. Their mass standardization during the 20th century was part of ...
and
pinyin Hanyu Pinyin, or simply pinyin, officially the Chinese Phonetic Alphabet, is the most common romanization system for Standard Chinese. ''Hanyu'' () literally means 'Han Chinese, Han language'—that is, the Chinese language—while ''pinyin' ...
romanization. The most recent ''Xinhua Zidian'' edition (the 12th) contains 3,300 compounds and includes over 13,000
logograms In a written language, a logogram (from Ancient Greek 'word', and 'that which is drawn or written'), also logograph or lexigraph, is a written character that represents a semantic component of a language, such as a word or morpheme. Chinese ...
, including
traditional Chinese characters Traditional Chinese characters are a standard set of Chinese character forms used to written Chinese, write Chinese languages. In Taiwan, the set of traditional characters is regulated by the Ministry of Education (Taiwan), Ministry of Educat ...
and
variant Chinese characters Chinese characters may have several variant forms—visually distinct glyphs that represent the same underlying meaning and pronunciation. Variants of a given character are ''allographs'' of one another, and many are directly analogous to allog ...
.
Bopomofo Bopomofo, also called Zhuyin Fuhao ( ; ), or simply Zhuyin, is a Chinese transliteration, transliteration system for Standard Chinese and other Sinitic languages. It is the principal method of teaching Chinese Mandarin pronunciation in Taiwa ...
is used as a supplement alongside Pinyin. ''Xinhua Zidian'' is divided into 189 "
radicals Radical (from Latin: ', root) may refer to: Politics and ideology Politics *Classical radicalism, the Radical Movement that began in late 18th century Britain and spread to continental Europe and Latin America in the 19th century *Radical politics ...
" or "section headers". More recent editions have followed a GB13000.1 national standard in using a 201-radical system. Besides their popular concise version ''Xinhua Zidian'', Commercial Press also publishes a large-print edition and a ''Xinhua Dictionary with English Translation''. In addition, the Shanxi Education Press publishes a pinyin-edition ''Xinhua Zidian'' with both characters and orthographically precise transcriptions.


History

Under the aegis of the
Chinese Academy of Social Sciences The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) is a Chinese state research institute and think tank. It is a ministry-level institution under the State Council of the People's Republic of China. The CASS is the highest academic institution and c ...
, the
People's Education Press The People's Education Press (PEP; ) is the oldest publishing house of the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China. It was founded on December 1, 1950, and the name was inscribed by Mao Zedong in his own handwriting. The main task ...
published the original ''Xinhua Zidian'' in 1953. The linguist and lexicographer Wei Jiangong (魏建功, 1901–1980) was chief editor. In 1957, the Commercial Press published the ''Xinhua Zidian'' (1st edition), which was alphabetically
collated Collation is the assembly of written information into a standard order. Many systems of collation are based on numerical order or alphabetical order, or extensions and combinations thereof. Collation is a fundamental element of most office fil ...
in pinyin order. They have subsequently revised this dictionary ten times, with over 200 printing runs, and it is a longtime
bestseller A bestseller is a book or other media noted for its top selling status, with bestseller lists published by newspapers, magazines, and book store chains. Some lists are broken down into classifications and specialties (novel, nonfiction book, cookb ...
among students in China. In early 2004, the total number of published copies exceeded 400 million. When
San Marino San Marino, officially the Republic of San Marino, is a landlocked country in Southern Europe, completely surrounded by Italy. Located on the northeastern slopes of the Apennine Mountains, it is the larger of two European microstates, microsta ...
, a tiny country surrounded by Italy, was building a relationship with China in the 1970s, the Sammarinese gave a three-volume encyclopedia they had published, as a present to Chinese officials. However, due to the chaos caused by the
Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a Social movement, sociopolitical movement in the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). It was launched by Mao Zedong in 1966 and lasted until his de ...
in the area of publishing, China only could give a copy of the little ''Xinhua Zidian'' in return. As a result, the Chinese government decided to publish a series of new dictionaries in 1975, including
Hanyu Da Cidian The ''Hanyu Da Cidian'' (), also known as the Grand Chinese Dictionary, is the most inclusive available Chinese dictionary. Lexicographically comparable to the ''Oxford English Dictionary'', it has Historical linguistics, diachronic coverage of ...
and some Chinese-foreign languages dictionaries. The dictionary was strongly affected by the political environment under Mao. In its 1971 edition, the dictionary contained 46 quotations of Chairman Mao, and slogans such as "Long live Chairman Mao!"


Mobile app

The Commercial Press presented its official app on
Apple Store The Apple Store is a chain of Retail, retail stores owned and operated by Apple Inc. The stores sell, service and repair various Apple products, including Macintosh, Mac desktop and MacBook laptop personal computers, iPhone smartphones, iPad ta ...
in June 2017. It supports identifying hànzì characters by handwriting, voice, or camera. It also provides a pronunciation of the characters read by
Li Ruiying Li Ruiying (; born 16 July 1961) is a Chinese media personality and politician, best known for being the long-time anchor of the China Central Television (CCTV) program ''Xinwen Lianbo''. Li is the vice-president of China Association of Radio a ...
, the former news presenter of ''
Xinwen Lianbo ''Xinwen Lianbo'' () is a Chinese daily news television programme produced by state-owned television broadcaster China Central Television (CCTV). It is shown simultaneously by all local TV stations in mainland China, making it one of the world ...
''.


Lawsuits

The use of the term ''Xinhua Zidian'' has been disputed in China since the publishing of the dictionary is no longer arranged by the government. The Commercial Press insisted that the name is a specific term while other publishing houses believed that it is a generic term, as many of them published their own Chinese dictionary under the name. In 2016, The Commercial Press (Beijing) filed a lawsuit at Beijing intellectual property court, claiming Sinolingua Co., Ltd. had violated The Commercial Press's trademark for Xinhua Zidian by publishing ''Xinhua Zidian'' without permission from The Commercial Press, even though the trademark name was not registered. The original case started when 3.2 million copies of student edition of Xinhua Zidian (学生新华字典) published by a company in
Hubei Hubei is a province of China, province in Central China. It has the List of Chinese provincial-level divisions by GDP, seventh-largest economy among Chinese provinces, the second-largest within Central China, and the third-largest among inland ...
were recalled for poor quality.


See also

*
List of best-selling books This page provides lists of best-selling books and book series to date and in any language. ''"Best-selling"'' refers to the estimated number of copies sold of each book, rather than the number of books printed or currently owned. Comic book, Com ...
*''
Xiandai Hanyu Cidian ''Xiandai Hanyu Cidian'' ( zh , s = 现代汉语词典 , t = 現代漢語詞典 , p = Xiàndài Hànyǔ Cídiǎn , l = Modern Han Language Word Dictionary ), also known as ''A Dictionary of Current Chinese'' or ''Contemporary Chinese Dictionary'' ...
''


References

*''Xinhua Zidian'' (新华字典), 10th revised edition. Beijing: Commercial Press. 2004. , (large-print)


External links

*The Commercial Press (Beijing) page
Chinese
{{Dictionaries of Chinese Commercial Press Chinese dictionaries