Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 5.djvu/669

The number of the primitives has been variously estimated. Dr Marshman gives them at 3867, Callery at about 1000, and later writers have reckoned them to be from 1100 to 1200. Taking them even at the lowest of these figures, it will readily be imagined how, by combination with the 214 determinatives, they may be made to form the thirty and odd thousand distinct characters of the language, since, of course, it would be possible by combining each of the 1000 primitives with every one of the 214 determinatives, to form more than seven times that number of characters.

To illustrate this system of formation, we will take the primitive 我 ngo, “I,” which by combination with 27 determinatives, produces as many derivatives having the same phonetic value, in this way combined with the determinative 山 “a mountain,&rdquot; it becomes 峩 ngo, “a high mountain;” with 女 neu, “a woman,” 娥 ngo, “fair,” “beautiful;” with 艸 tsao, “grass,” 莪 ngo, “a certain herb;” with 鳥 neaou, “a bird,” 鵝 ngo, “a goose,” and so on. From these examples it will be observed that the determinatives play the part in some instances of adjectives; and in combination with their primitives they form an exact parallel with many Egyptian and Assyrian ideophonetics. The following example in Egyptian shows precisely the same formation in the composition of the characters, and in the respective value of their parts, as is seen in the Chinese instance just referred to.

Un means in Egyptian “a hare;” combined with this determinative

, it becomes

Un, “to open;” and with this

,

Un “an hour.” Speaking of Assyrian hieroglyphics, Sir Henry Rawlinson says, “Certain classes of words have a sign prefixed or suffixed to them, more commonly the former, by which their general character is indicated. The names of gods, of men, of cities, of tribes, of wild animals, of domestic animals, of metals, of months, of the points of the compass, and of dignities are thus accompanied. The sign prefixed or suffixed may have originally represented a word; but when used in the way here spoken of, it is believed that it was not sounded, but served simply to indicate to the reader the sort of word which was placed before it.”

These words of Sir Henry Rawlinson may be illustrated by the following examples. 𒄑 means in Assyrian “wood,” and is used as the determinative for things made of wood. Thus in combination with the primitive 𒉺 it becomes 𒄑𒉺 “a sceptre;” and when combined with the primitive 𒉼 we have 𒄑𒉼 “a bow.” Again, 𒌨 is used in the same way as the determinative for all carnivorous animals. Thus, for instance, 𒌨𒌆 is “a dog,” and 𒌨𒈤 is “a lion.” It will be seen that both the Egyptian and Assyrian characters here quoted are constructed on exactly the same principle as that to be observed in the formation of the majority of Chinese characters, but it is noticeable that in Assyrian the primitives do not retain in composition their phonetic values, as they generally do in Chinese, and as they often do in Egyptian.

Marking, then, the forces of the two parts of the characters, it is easy to imagine the way in which new characters have from time to time been formed. Supposing, for instance, that a tree for which a Chinaman wishes to give a name on paper is known to him colloquially as ma. The coiner of the new character would then in the first place choose a common phonetic or primitive possessing the sound ma; very possibly he would take the hieroglyphic 馬 ma “a horse” and would combine with it the determinative 木 muh, meaning “wood.” The new character would then stand thus 榪, and might be understood to signify “the ma tree;” but, unless previously informed, the reader would be left in complete ignorance as to the sort of tree meant, as the parts of the character would only supply the information that it was either a tree or something made of wood, and that it was to be pronounced ma. This is equally the case, speaking generally, with all the characters. By a careful study of the phonetics it is possible to arrive at the sounds or approximate sounds—for certain variations constantly occur—of the characters of the language; but the only hint at their meanings is to be derived from the determinatives, which point only to the general nature of the objects or actions signified.

As has already been said, the determinatives are 214 in number, and these have been considered by many of the native dictionary-makers to furnish convenient headings under which to arrange the characters of the language. Again, others have chosen to classify the characters according to their final sounds. Both systems have their advantages. By adopting the first, the headings are comparatively few, and the characters are, roughly speaking, classified according to the generic meanings they have in common; and the second gives constant practice to students in remembering the tones and correct rhyming pronunciation of the characters. But in both the phonetic relationship between the primitives is entirely lost sight of. And this is much to be regretted, since, as Callery and others have pointed out, the scientific way of arranging the characters would be by placing them under their primitives, by which means the respective values of both the primitives and determinatives would be brought out in prominent relief. Only in two Chinese dictionaries that we have met with have any attempts been made thus to arrange the characters, and the older of these, on which the later work was probably framed, owes the system on which it is composed to the experience imported from Japan by the co-compiler, who was a native of that country.

In the course of the above remarks a few instances have been given of the original and modern forms of the styles of same characters, as, for example, and 馬. But, as may readily be supposed, the change from one to the other was not made all at once, and Chinese books afford instances of six distinct styles of writing, varying in clearness from the square character used in the books at the present day to the Seal and Grass or cursive characters, which are noted for their obscurity. These styles are described as the Chuen shoo or “seal character,” the Le shoo or “official character,” the Keae shoo or “ model character,” the Hing shoo or “running character,” the Tsaou shoo or “grass character,” and the Sung shoo or “Sung-dynasty character,” and may be illustrated by the following example, in which the character 草 tsaou “herbs” is shown written in all the six styles just specified:—seal character ; official character 艸; model character 草; running character ; grass character ; and Sung character 草. But above and beyond these six styles of writing, Chinese penmen not unfrequently allow their imaginations to run riot when engaged in fanciful or ornamental pieces of caligraphy. An extraordinary specimen of this quaint taste is to be seen in the Chinese Library of the British Museum, where there is a copy of the Emperor Keen-lung's poem on Moukden, printed both in Chinese and Manchoo in 32 kinds of strangely fanciful characters.

We will now pass on to the sounds of the language; and the first thing concerning them which strikes the student on becoming acquainted with his dictionary is their extreme poverty as compared with the characters. There are over 30,000 characters in the language, and these