Abstract
It is not reflected expressly in the literature when "卯" evolved from a noun expressing time into a verbal measure word. It exists in two districts far away from each other: first, it is commonly used in the Hangzhou dialect, where it has grammaticalized into a suffix of time noun and diffused to Northern Wu; second, it is more widely distributed in dialects of Central Plains Mandarin and Jin in the vicinity of Henan, but with a limited range of functions. The period connecting these two groups of dialects lies in the transitional period between the Northern Song dynasty and Southern Song dynasty, implying that the word emerged in Southern Mandarin during the Northern Song dynasty at the latest, and transferred by migrants from Kaifeng to Hangzhou in the early Southern Song dynasty. Its grammaticalization pathway is also reflected in texts and dialects. The character word “卯” corroborates the views of Shuxiang Lü and Jerry Norman on the evolution of Southern Mandarin.
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