A Handbook of Old Chinese Phonology

Baxter proposes a new phonological reconstruction system for Old Chinese, the Chinese language of the early and mid Zhou dynasty--that is, approximately the 11th to the seventh centuries B.C.--which he takes to be the ancestor of all attested varieties of Chinese, and the earliest stage of the Chinese language that can presently be reconstructed from Chinese evidence alone. His approach differs from much previous work in this area by paying special attention to the naturalness of the phonological systems and changes reconstructed; by placing special importance on the phonological pattern of Middle Chinese and the clues it provides about earlier stages; by reexamining and revising the traditional analysis of Old Chinese rhyming developed by Chinese scholars of the Qing dynasty, using newly-developed statistical methods; and by taking a new approach to the use of evidence from the Chinese script. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR