China

Fangyan

方言 (Dialects)

Spoken Chinese was never one language but a patchwork of regional dialects, and recording which word each region used for the same thing preserves a linguistic map that formal written Chinese otherwise erases.

Read the text

Descends from

  • Erya · c. 221 BC - AD 9

Commentary

Readers' notes on this work. No account needed - be scholarly, or at least civil.

Loading commentary…