The background and early life of An Lu-shan.

Abstract not available

Local Resistance in Early Medieval Chinese Historiography and the Problem of Religious Overinterpretation

Official Chinese historiography is a treasure trove of information on local resistance to the centralised empire in early medieval China (third to sixth century). Sinologists specialised in the study of Chinese religions commonly reconstruct the religious history of the era by interpreting some of these data. In the process, however, the primary purpose of the historiography of local resistance is often overlooked, and historical interpretation easily becomes ‘overinterpretation’—that is, ‘fabricating false intensity’ and ‘seeing intensity everywhere’, as French historian Paul Veyne proposed to define the term. Focusing on a cluster of historical anecdotes collected in the standard histories of the four centuries under consideration, this study discusses the supposedly ‘religious’ nature of some of the data they contain

Graphic loans: East Asia and beyond

The national languages of East Asia (Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese) have made extensive use of a type of linguistic borrowing sometimes referred to as a 'graphic loan'. Such loans have no place in the conventional classification of loans based on Haugen (1950) or Weinreich (1953), and research on loan word theory and phonology generally overlooks them. The classic East Asian phenomenon is discussed and a framework is proposed to describe its mechanism. It is argued that graphic loans are more than just 'spelling pronunciations', because they are a systematic and widespread process, independent of but not inferior to phonological borrowing. The framework is then expanded to cover a range of other cases of borrowing between languages to show that graphic loans are not a uniquely East Asian phenomenon, and therefore need to be considered as a major category of loan

Rime length, stress, and association domains

Every regular Chinese syllable has a syllable tone (the tone we get when the syllable is read in isolation). In some Chinese languages, the tonal pattern of a multisyllabic expression is basically a concatenation of the syllable tones. In other Chinese languages, the tonal pattern of a multisyllabic expression is determined solely by the initial syllable. I call the former M -languages (represented by Mandarin) and the latter S -languages (represented by Shanghai). I argue that there is an additional difference in rime structures between the two language groups. In S-languages, all rimes are simple, i.e., there are no underlying diphthongs or codas. In M-languages, all regular rimes are heavy. I further argue that a syllable keeps its underlying tones only if it has stress. Independent metrical evidence tells us that heavy rimes may carry inherent stress. Thus, in M-languages, all regular syllables are stressed and retain their underlying tones (which may or may not undergo further changes). In contrast, in S-languages, regular rimes do not carry inherent stress; instead, only those syllables that are assigned stress by rule can keep their underlying tones and hence head a multisyllabic tonal domain.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/42998/1/10831_2005_Article_BF01440582.pd

The Peoples of the Steppe Frontier in Early Chinese Sources

Nascent Chinese civilization once shared the north China plain and the surrounding uplands with various non-Chinese “barbarians”. The Chinese language itself is related to the Tibeto-Burman language family. Some of the “barbarians” to the west belonged to this group, especially the Qiang. Of the major non-Chinese groups, the Yi, along the eastern seaboard, probably spoke an Austroasiatic language. They can be identified with a series of coastal Neolithic cultures, elements of which contributed much to the formation of Chinese civilization in the Central Plain. It has often been assumed that the non-Chinese in the north uplands, the Di and Xiongnu – in Han times nomadic rulers of the steppes of Mongolia – spoke Altaic languages. Although there is good reason to think that the Hu did speak Altaic (i.e. Mongolic), the Xiongnu, first seen in the Ordos and linked to the earlier Yiqu, were linguistically quite different. Their language may have been Yeniseian or an aberrant form of Tibeto-Burman, or without living relatives. In Han times, when hu had become a general term for horse-riding nomads, applied especially to the Xiongnu, the original Hu became known as the Eastern Hu. They were differentiated in Han sources into the Xianbei (*Särbi), ancestors of the historical Mongols, and the Wuhuan (*Awar), a name recognizable as that of the Avars who invaded Europe in the sixth century. The earliest Turkic-speaking peoples that can be identified in Chinese sources are the Dingling, Gekun or Jiankun, and Xinli, located in South Siberia. The nomadic power immediately to the west of the Xiongnu in Han times were the Yuezhi. When the Xiongnu defeated them, their main body moved west, eventually to the Amu Darya, extinguishing the Greek kingdom in Bactria and later establishing the Kushan empire. It is argued that they were Indo-Europeans, speaking a Tocharian language of the type attested in later documents from the oasis states of the Tarim basin. Recent finds of Caucasoid mummies in Xinjiang dating from the early second millennium BCE onward suggest that this was the time when Tocharian speakers first reached the borderlands of China, bringing with them important cultural elements from the west – metallurgy and the horse-drawn chariot – that played an essential role in the formation of Chinese civilization. The beginning of the Chinese bronze age around 2000 BCE, coinciding with the traditional date of the founding of first dynasty, the Xia, was probably indirectly stimulated by this event

Narodi sa stepske granice u ranim kineskim izvorima

Nascent Chinese civilization once shared the north China plain and the surrounding uplands with various non-Chinese “barbarians”. The Chinese language itself is related to the Tibeto-Burman language family. Some of the “barbarians” to the west belonged to this group, especially the Qiang. Of the major non-Chinese groups, the Yi, along the eastern seaboard, probably spoke an Austroasiatic language. They can be identified with a series of coastal Neolithic cultures, elements of which contributed much to the formation of Chinese civilization in the Central Plain. It has often been assumed that the non-Chinese in the north uplands, the Di and Xiongnu – in Han times nomadic rulers of the steppes of Mongolia – spoke Altaic languages. Although there is good reason to think that the Hu did speak Altaic (i.e. Mongolic), the Xiongnu, first seen in the Ordos and linked to the earlier Yiqu, were linguistically quite different. Their language may have been Yeniseian or an aberrant form of Tibeto-Burman, or without living relatives. In Han times, when hu had become a general term for horse-riding nomads, applied especially to the Xiongnu, the original Hu became known as the Eastern Hu. They were differentiated in Han sources into the Xianbei (*Särbi), ancestors of the historical Mongols, and the Wuhuan (*Awar), a name recognizable as that of the Avars who invaded Europe in the sixth century. The earliest Turkic-speaking peoples that can be identified in Chinese sources are the Dingling, Gekun or Jiankun, and Xinli, located in South Siberia. The nomadic power immediately to the west of the Xiongnu in Han times were the Yuezhi. When the Xiongnu defeated them, their main body moved west, eventually to the Amu Darya, extinguishing the Greek kingdom in Bactria and later establishing the Kushan empire. It is argued that they were Indo-Europeans, speaking a Tocharian language of the type attested in later documents from the oasis states of the Tarim basin. Recent finds of Caucasoid mummies in Xinjiang dating from the early second millennium BCE onward suggest that this was the time when Tocharian speakers first reached the borderlands of China, bringing with them important cultural elements from the west – metallurgy and the horse-drawn chariot – that played an essential role in the formation of Chinese civilization. The beginning of the Chinese bronze age around 2000 BCE, coinciding with the traditional date of the founding of first dynasty, the Xia, was probably indirectly stimulated by this event.U osvitu povijesti, tek nastajuća kineska civilizacija (njezini se prvi pisani izvori pojavljuju u završnim stoljećima drugoga tisućljeća prije n.e. na tzv. gatateljskim kostima Shanga) dijelila je sjevernokinesku ravnicu i okolna visočja (u današnjim pokrajinama Shangdong, Shanxi i Shaanxi) s raznim nekineskim »barbarima«. I sam kineski jezik, koji će u pisanom obliku postati sredstvom civilizacije, srodan je jezicima iz rasprostranjene tibetoburmanske jezične porodice. Neki nekineski «barbari» na zapadu zacijelo su pripadali toj skupini, i to osobito narod Qiang, koji se spominje već na gatateljskim kostima a odnosi se na neprijateljske narode na zapadu. Ime tog naroda zadržao je do danas jedan manjinski narod u zapadnom Sichuanu. Od najvažnijih nekineskih skupina, tzv. Yi, zemljoradničko ljudstvo naseljeno uz istočno primorje, vjerojatno je govorilo kakvim austronezijskim jezikom srodnim vijetnamskom. Možemo ga poistovjetiti s nekolicinom primorskih neolitskih kultura, čiji su se sadržaji proširili kulturnom difuzijom na zapad, gdje su uvelike pridonijeli nastanku kineske civilizacije u Središnjoj Ravnici. Obično se drži da su nekineski narodi na visočju sjeverno od Središnje Ravnice – poznati kao Di i Xiongnu, pojavivši se u razdoblju dinastije Han kao vladari mongolskih stepa – govorili nekim altajskim jezikom, turskim ili mongolskim. To pak nije vrlo vjerojatno. Postoje dobri razlozi pretpostaviti da su Hu, prvi strijelci-jahači što su ih Kinezi sreli na mongolskoj stepi, govorili mongolskim jezikom. Međutim, narod Xiongnu, koji se najprije pojavljuje u Ordosu južno od velikoga zavoja Žute Rijeke i koji je u krajnoj liniji povezan sa starijim naseljenim narodom Yiqu iz visočja Shaanbeia, između Ordosa i preddinastičke države Qin, bio je jezično prilično drukčiji. Možda je taj narod govorio jezikom iz jenisejske porodice, možda mu je jezik pripadao kakvu udaljenom tibetoburmanskom obliku, ili možda taj jezik uopće nema preživjelih srodnika. Za dinastije Han, kad je izraz hu postao općom oznakom za nomade-jahače, te kad se rabio osobito za Xiongnu, prvobitni narod Hu prozvat će se, razlike radi, «Istočni Hu». Izvori iz doba Hana razlikovali su u sklopu Istočnih Hu narod Xianbei (*Särbi), od kojega su napokon potekli povijesni Mongoli, i narod Wuhuan *Awar), kojih je ime povezano s Avarima koji su prodrli u Evropu u 6. stoljeću. Prvi narodi turskog govora koji se mogu identificirati u kineskim izvorima jesu Dingling, Gekun ili Jiankun i Xinli. Živjeli su na sjeveru, u južnom Sibiru. Xiongnu su ih pokorili na početku drugoga stoljeća prije n.e. U razdoblju Hana, odmah zapadno od Xiongnua nalazilo se mnoštvo nomadskog naroda Yuezhi. Kad su Xiongnu pokorili Yuezhije, glavnina potonjih pošla je na zapad i dospjela naposljetku do Amudarje, gdje je dokončila grčko kraljevstvo u Baktriji i zatim uspostavila carstvo Kušana u Afganistanu i sjevernoj Indiji. Tvrdi se da su Yuezhi bili Indoevropljani i da su govorili toharskim jezikom, tj. jezikom one vrste o kojoj svjedoče kasniji izvori iz država u oazama Tarimske kotline. Nedavna otkrića evropoidnih mumija u Xinjiangu, datiranih s početka drugoga tisućljeća prije n.e., sugeriraju da je to bilo vrijeme kad su govornici toharskog jezika najprije stigli do graničnih prostora Kine, donoseći sa sobom važne kulturne tekovine sa zapada – metalurgiju i bojna kola što su ih vukli konji – a te su tekovine imale bitnu ulogu u nastanku kineske civilizacije. Početak kineskoga brončanog doba oko 2000. prije n.e., što se podudara s tradicionalnim datumom osnutka prve dinastije Xia, vjerojatno se zbio pod neizravnim utjecajem toga događaja

Some notes on Chinese historical phonology

Pulleyblank Edwin G. Some notes on Chinese historical phonology. In: Bulletin de l'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient. Tome 69, 1981. pp. 277-288