Common Chinese and Early Chinese Morphology

Abstract

Most of the evidence used in the reconstruction of early Chinese is derived from data that is fundamentally textual in nature, supplemented by extrapolation from non-Chinese languages. Relatively little evidence comes directly from modern forms of Chinese. This is especially true in the study of early morphology. This paper proposes some principles for evaluating dialect evidence for early Chinese morphology. It is observed that although morphology is found in many modern dialects in various productive forms, these forms appear to be local and should not be pushed back into our reconstruction of the early language. The best attested form of classical morphology, what has been called derivation by tone change (sishēng hieyi), is supported primarily by texual evidence rather than productive modern examples; it appears to have been lexicalized from an early time, and its place within early Chinese cannot he said to be supported by dialect evidence. Based on original field-work from 1992 to 1996, the author presents data for two morphological features recently discussed by Laurent Sagart: a prefix *k- and an infix *-r-. It is argued that the * k-prefix is the ancient feature best supported in modern dialects, although some of Sagart's proposals about the development of *k- require further research. What Sagart considers an infix *-r- is here considered to be a form of sound symbolism rather than morphology. It is also argued that morphology was probably not a feature of whatever standard spoken language may have existed in late Warring States and Han times, since Han-time Chinese, in spite of their strong tendency to systematize all forms of knowledge, do not seem to have left anything like a paradigm of the morphology in their language. The examples discussed in this paper are therefore considered to have held only reliquary or non-standard status in Han times.