How are dialects formed?

According to the classification of Atlas of Chinese Language (Longman Publishing House, 1988), modern Chinese dialects are divided into ten dialects, namely, Mandarin, Jin dialect, Wu dialect, Hui dialect, Min dialect, Cantonese, Xiang dialect, Gan dialect, Hakka dialect and Pinghua. Among them, the status of Jin dialect and Pinghua in dialect system is still controversial. Opponents believe that Jin dialect is a sub-dialect of Mandarin and Pinghua is a sub-dialect of Cantonese. Let me briefly talk about how the major dialects of Chinese are formed.

1). Wu language

According to historical records? The family, Zhou's eldest son and second son, went to Xi 'an successively, and went south to Wuxi and Suzhou in Jiangsu. This is the first batch of northern Han Chinese who immigrated to Wudi as recorded in the history books. They brought with them China people from the Weishui River valley 3,000 years ago. As an independent dialect, Wu dialect has been clearly recorded in the documents of the Southern and Northern Dynasties, such as Shi Shuo Xin Yu and Yan Family Instructions. Geographically, Wu dialect developed from north to south, first formed in Suzhou and Wuxi, then spread to Ningshaoping Plain and Hangjiahu Plain in northern Zhejiang, and then entered central, southern and southwestern Zhejiang. There have been three great waves of northern Han people migrating to Wu-speaking areas in history: the first time was during the Three Kingdoms period, when the development and management of Jiangnan in Sun Wu era attracted a large number of northern immigrants; The second time was at the turn of the Jin Dynasty. Northerners not only fled because of the war, but also moved to Nanning Town, and crossed Qiantang River to go deep into eastern Zhejiang. The third time was at the turn of the Song Dynasty. Northern immigrants not only created Hangzhou dialect island in later generations, but also continued to move southward in large numbers and settled in Wenzhou area in southern Zhejiang. The dialects brought by the immigrants from the north in the past dynasties merged with the dialects of the original residents in Wu dialect area, and gradually formed the modern Wu dialect.

2). Xiang dialect

Chu language has been mentioned many times by philosophers in the pre-Qin period, Yang Xiong in the Han Dynasty, Xu Shen in the Han Dynasty, and Guo Pu in the Dialect Annotation in the Jin Dynasty. Jingchu, Nanchu, Dongchu, Jingru, Jiangxiang and Jiuxi in Jiangxiang use Chu language. These places are equivalent to today's Hunan and Hubei. Chu dialect is very prominent in Chinese dialects before Jin Dynasty. According to the relevant records in the bold and contemptuous article of Shi Shuo Xin Yu, for the northerners at that time, the intelligibility of Chu dialect was very poor, which sounded like a bird song and was difficult to understand. The earliest source of the ancient Xiang dialect should be the ancient Chu dialect, but due to the influence of the northern dialect brought by the immigrants in the past dynasties, especially in the middle Tang Dynasty, Changsha's modern Xiang dialect is close to Mandarin, and the southern Xiang dialect should retain the characteristics of the older Xiang dialect.

3) Gan dialect and Hakka dialect

The core areas of Gan dialect and Hakka dialect are in Jiangxi and its neighboring eastern Fujian and northern Guangdong. Up to now, Jiangxi has not appeared as an independent dialect place name in Dialect written by Yang Xiong in Han Dynasty, Shuowen Jiezi written by Xu Shen in Han Dynasty and Dialect Annotation written by Guo Pu in Jin Dynasty. Their places include Southern Chu or Wu Yueyang in Chu Ci, Wu Chu in Shuowen Jiezi and Dialect Annotation. It can be seen that the characteristics of its local independent dialects are not significant. Ancient Jiangxi was geographically called "the tail of aconite and Chu". Before the formation of Gan dialect and Hakka dialect, ancient Gan dialect may be a mixed dialect with the characteristics of Wu dialect and Xiang dialect. In the early Tang Dynasty, a large number of northern immigrants entered Poyang Lake Plain in northern Jiangxi. The dialects of these immigrants came into contact with the ancient Jiangxi dialect, forming the most primitive Gan dialect. In the middle and late Tang Dynasty, northern immigrants arrived, and from northern Jiangxi to central Jiangxi and southern Jiangxi, Gan dialect was further developed. Hakkas from the north first settled in the Gan dialect area, and moved westward to western Fujian and northern Guangdong during the Song and Yuan Dynasties. The original Gan dialect they used was integrated with the indigenous dialects in southeastern Jiangxi, western Fujian and northern Guangdong, forming the Hakka dialect in Yuan and Ming Dynasties.

4). Guangzhou people

According to Huainanzi, Qin crossed the border a little, and sent 500,000 troops. The more peaceful it was, Guilin, Nanhai and Xiang Jun were set up to emigrate people and mix the mixed land. At the beginning of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Ma Yuan went to South Vietnam, but his foot soldiers increased. According to Zi Zhi Tong Jian, at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, Shi Xie was a toe-crossing satrap, and his brother lived in Guangdong, and many of them joined in China. In the Song Dynasty, due to the invasion of Liao and Jin in the north, a large number of Han people took refuge in Guangdong. These new immigrants are called customers. According to the records of Yuanfeng Nine Domains in the Northern Song Dynasty, Hakka accounts for 39% of Guangdong's total population. It seems that it is the northern dialect brought by immigrants in the Song Dynasty that finally laid the foundation of modern Cantonese. In the Song Dynasty, Zhu's Zhuzi School 138 said: "There are many false voices in all directions, but the voices spoken by people in Guangdong and China are still good." This shows that the Cantonese pronunciation in the Song Dynasty was more in line with the standard pronunciation of the Central Plains at that time. Chen Li, a phonologist in the Qing Dynasty, said in "The Phonology of Guangzhou": "Guangzhou dialect conforms to Sui and Tang Zhiyun, and some people are not as good as others, and the rest of Guangzhou people are also. Please say it briefly. " He pointed out that there are five characteristics of Guangzhou pronunciation that are consistent with the rhyme-cutting sound, such as all four tones are clear and muddy, and the salty rhyme is not mixed with the mountain sound. That's right. It seems that it is the northern dialect brought by immigrants in the Song Dynasty that finally laid the foundation of modern Cantonese.

5). Min dialect

The first batch of Han Chinese entered Fujian in the late Western Han Dynasty, when the Central Plains regime established the first county in Fujian, namely Ye County, which is now Fuzhou. The first batch of Han people who entered Fujian in the Han Dynasty probably went from Wu. Wu people entered Fujian on a large scale, which should be between the late Han Dynasty and the early Jin Dynasty. There are two routes for immigrants to enter Fujian. One is to land on the coast from the sea with Yexian as a midway port; The second is the transfer from land to northwest Fujian. For resettlement and management, the government has established five new counties in coastal areas: Luojiang (now Fuding), Yuanfeng (now Fuzhou), Marvin (now Xiapu), Dong 'an (now Quanzhou) and Tong 'an. There are six new counties in northwest Fujian: Hanxing (now Pucheng), Jian 'an (now Jian 'ou), Nanping, Jianping (now Jianyang), Shaowu and Jiangle. Because of the different immigration sources in coastal areas and northwest Fujian, and the inconvenient transportation in coastal areas and northwest Fujian for a long time, there are still obvious differences in Fujian dialects between the two places. It was not until the Tang and Song Dynasties that Min dialect, as an independent dialect with star characteristics, was finally clarified and valued. "Fulao" is a family name representing Min dialect residents, which was first seen in Tang literature. In Song Taizong, Liu Changyan, a native of Nan 'an, Quanzhou, Fujian Province, served as the right admonition doctor, but at that time people refused to accept his lack of knowledge of Min dialect.

Due to the lack of research materials, it is impossible to deeply explore the history of the formation of Hui language. Judging from the characteristics of dialect, it can be roughly considered that its bottom layer is Wu dialect, or it is developed from Wu dialect.

Narrow Chinese dialects can't include Putonghua, so it's not discussed above. From the above discussion, we can see that the six southern dialects, namely Wu dialect, Min dialect, Cantonese, Xiang dialect, Gan dialect and Hakka dialect, are directly differentiated from the northern dialect from the perspective of dialect genesis, while Min dialect and Hakka dialect are secondary, that is, they are differentiated from Wu dialect and Gan dialect respectively. From the historical perspective of dialect formation, Wu dialect and Xiang dialect are the oldest, followed by Cantonese and Gan dialect.

The stronghold spread and diffusion spread of dialects

Population migration is the most direct and important reason for the formation of dialects. It is common that some people who live in one place move to other places and form new dialects different from their original places over time. For example, some Min people left Fujian and moved to Hainan Island, forming a new Min dialect.

The original reason of several southern dialects in Chinese is that northerners migrate to the south. Before Qin and Han Dynasties, Baiyue lived in Jiangnan. Yan Shigu noted in "History of Han Geography": "There are thousands of miles from the meeting to the crossing of toes, and each has its own caste." "Baiyue" means "Baiyue". The word meaning is different, and the writing of Historical Records is mostly "Yue", while the writing of Hanshu is mostly "Yue".

Generally speaking, the way for northerners to migrate to the south is to build large residential areas on the main roads, then build smaller residential areas in suitable places in rural areas, and then gradually spread to the four fields. China, North Renye Fang spread to the south. At first, Chinese was only used in the cities where Han people lived, and the vast rural areas were still dominated by local indigenous languages. Later, it gradually spread through mixed living. The situation is just as the later Han Dynasty's Biography of Southwest China said, "Although the land with unified toes is located in counties, its words are different and retranslation is common. ..... Later, I moved to China to be a sinner, so I lived together, but I knew a little about words and gradually became polite. " In the Tang Dynasty, Liu Zongyuan was relegated to Liuzhou, Guangxi, and his "Song of Dong Mang in Liuzhou" contained: "I am afraid to ask the court to retranslate it", which shows that the language of Liuzhou indigenous people was still quite popular at that time. This gradual process has continued since the Han Dynasty and is still going on in the southwest. For example, as far as Zhejiang is concerned, this process began in the Qin Dynasty and did not end until the end of the Ming Dynasty. But as far as most parts of Guangxi are concerned, this process is far from over. At present, the general situation is that cities, counties and cities use Mandarin or Cantonese, towns use Pinghua (a dialect of China), and rural areas still use Zhuang language.

From the perspective of historical administrative geography, the process of Han people moving from the north to the south is divided into two steps. The first step is to set up a county, that is, to set up a county (mother county) in a residential area where the Han people are concentrated; The second step is to divide counties, and the population of the mother county will increase to a certain number. Some people will be moved to nearby places and new settlements will be established, that is, counties. In a county, the county seat is the largest residential area. With the increase of population, smaller residential areas are established in rural areas, that is, towns, and villages are below the towns. Han nationality and China people in the north settled and spread in the south with the establishment and analysis of counties. Sub-counties from the same mother county naturally have similar dialects, and even in modern times, they still belong to the same dialect area. Because a dialect is of the same origin and a dialect comes from a county in the same mother county, because of the relationship between human geography, its people communicate more and dialects are easy to keep consistent. For example, Hewlett-Packard County established in Taizhou, central Zhejiang Province in the Western Han Dynasty, Tiantai in the Three Kingdoms Period, Xianju in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, Hewlett-Packard Huangyan in the Tang Dynasty, Huangyan Wenling in the Ming Dynasty, and Taizhou Sanmen in 1940 (namely ancient Hewlett-Packard). Tiantai, Xianju, Huangyan, Wenling and Sanmen all come from the same mother county, and the dialects of these places are relatively close, forming a sub-dialect area within Wu dialect, namely Taizhou piece.

The Relationship between Historical Administrative Geography and Dialect Geography

China's local administrative divisions and their management system are rare in the world for their long history, strict division and effective management. China has been an agricultural society for thousands of years. Unless there is war or famine, most people regard leaving their hometown by the well as a dangerous road. In the era of Shengping, the scope of activities was roughly limited to the government. This cultural background makes the historical administrative divisions closely related to the Chinese dialect divisions, especially the sub-dialect divisions, which are mainly manifested in two aspects: First, there is great consistency within the dialects based on the old government and the state (secondary administrative districts), and all provinces have such examples. Such as Xuzhou, Jiangsu, Fujian and Guangdong provinces. As far as southern dialects are concerned, a large part of the boundaries of dialect areas or sub-dialect areas can even be traced back to the boundaries of secondary administrative regions in the Southern Song Dynasty. For example, from the Tang Dynasty, Huizhou (called Zhou She in Tang and Song Dynasties) governed six counties, namely Jixi, Shexian, Xiuning, yi county, Qimen and Wuyuan, and it remained unchanged until the end of the Qing Dynasty. Today, Hui languages in Anhui and Jiangxi are also distributed in these counties and cities. Today, Wuyuan in Jiangxi belongs to Huizhou dialect, and the administrative division has belonged to Zhangzhou (later called Huizhou) since the Tang Dynasty. The role of administrative divisions in the formation of dialect divisions far exceeds other human geography phenomena. From the perspective of universal dialect geography, administrative geography will have a certain impact on dialect geography. But no country's administrative geography has had such a profound influence on dialect geography.

There are two main reasons.

First, counties belonging to the same government are often separated from the same mother county, and the origins of dialects are the same. For example, in several counties in Wenzhou, Zhejiang Province, the most primitive mother county was Hewlett-Packard (now Linhai) in the Western Han Dynasty. Yongning (early Eastern Han Dynasty) and Ruian (Three Kingdoms) were separated from Huipu, Pingyang (Jin) and Yueqing (Jin) were separated from Yongning, and Taishun (Ming) was separated from Pingyang and Ruian.

Secondly, in the ancient agricultural society of China, "Fu" was a modest region. In the era of Shengping, ordinary people lived in a mansion all the year round, and they could live and work in peace and contentment without setting foot outside the mansion. In addition to the unusual things such as exams, business, travel, etc., bigger things can be solved in the county or Fucheng. Therefore, a dialect within a government can easily form its own system, which is different from other provinces. Fucheng is the political, economic, cultural and transportation center of a government, and its dialect is naturally a strong dialect. In the general county annals of Ming and Qing dynasties, it is often mentioned that dialects attach importance to politics. For example, Jiajing's "Shanghai County Records" said: "The pronunciation of dialects focuses on Huating." Shanghai County belongs to Songjiang Prefecture, and Huating is the old name of Songjiang. The strength of Fucheng dialect has centripetal force and cohesion, which is an important factor to maintain the consistency of the whole dialect.

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