Classical Chinese has no symbols

1. Why does Chinese classical Chinese have no punctuation marks?

Now let me complain: Who asked such a painful and tiring question?

It’s easy to ask, but it’s life-threatening to verify. =========================== Violence blocking line==================== ========== The following is a formal answer to the question: First of all, ancient texts have punctuation, for example: One or two short lines are used to indicate punctuation in the "Hou Ma Meng Shu" in the Spring and Autumn Period.

The short horizontal line circled in red above is the punctuation mark. "Laozi" in the silk script "Laozi" written by Wang Mawang of Han Dynasty: The punctuation points are marked with blue circles. At this time, the punctuation system has become more complicated. In addition to the previous single and double dashes, there are also corner symbols, triangle symbols, and dot symbols. Square symbols, etc., are used in different ways.

Tang Dynasty Lu Deming's "Classic Interpretations" (pictured is the Song Dynasty version): The pauses and periods here have basically taken their current form. The Song Dynasty's "Shang Shu Biao Annotation" uses patterns such as circles, squares, black triangles, flat strips, and semicircles as punctuations.

The punctuation in "Xi Wei Lu" of the Ming Dynasty is similar to that of "Classic Interpretation", basically there are two types of pauses and periods, and circles are also used as emphasis marks. "Yongle Dadian" of the Ming Dynasty: only uses the period (circle) as a punctuation mark, which is the small red circle in the picture.

In addition, there are punctuation methods that do not use symbols in classical Chinese, such as: Space punctuation: spaces are used as punctuation, such as the Song version of "Huayang Guozhi": Annotation punctuation: with Annotations are used as punctuation, that is, annotations are added to the entire sentence, such as the Song version of "Selected Annotations of Liuchen" Chinese character punctuation: Chinese characters such as "Ju" and "Read" are used as punctuation, that is, adding "Ju" or "Ju" after each sentence The word "read" is used to break sentences, such as the Qing Dynasty's "Four Books Sentence Reading Interpretation". Of course, there are also a large number of books without punctuation in ancient times. For these books, specific methods are often used to express punctuation. For example, in "Poetry", repeated forms and neat sentences are used In "Sao", "xi" is used to indicate the end of a sentence. Teacher Fan Yanting has already explained it in detail, so I won't go into details here. Note that these are not only methods of dividing sentences, but also issues that must be paid attention to when writing articles at that time.

"Wen Xin Diao Long·Zhang Ju" talks about the use of function words to help readers break sentences when writing articles: "The poet also used the word "xi" to enter the sentence limit, and "Chu Ci" used it, and the word It comes from outside the sentence. The word "Xunxi" carries the sentence, but the words help the remaining sound.

Shun's chant of "Southern Wind" has been used for a long time, but Wei Wu is not good at it, so it is not beneficial to the literary meaning! As for "Fu Wei Gai Gu", it is the first song of the beginning; "It comes to Yi" is the old style of Zhaju; Use it realistically.

If you use good luck to close the gap in the style, you will be able to get more than a few sentences. Methods still cannot solve all problems, so there are many unsolved questions in ancient texts. For example, the first sentence of "The Analects of Confucius·Zihan": "Zihan talked about profit, fate and benevolence" should we conclude: "Zihan talked about profit, "With fate, with benevolence." Or "With fate, with benevolence." There have always been different explanations.

When encountering these problems, you need to refer to many commentaries, combined with your elementary school skills, and carefully identify them to understand their original meaning. In fact, everyone should be able to see at this point that not only was there no punctuation in ancient China, but there were a large number of books with punctuation.

The problem is that the punctuation system is not unified. Almost every family uses a system. You use circles and I use squares. You use solid ones and I use hollow ones. You mark on the left side of the text and I mark it on the bottom of the text. ...Like other kinds of knowledge, the problem lies in the lack of system. There is no system, so it cannot be spread and will be lost. 2. Why does Chinese classical Chinese have no punctuation marks?

Now let me complain: Who asked such a painful and tiring question? It's easy to ask, but it's life-threatening to verify.

=========================== Violence blocking line============ =================

The following is the formal answer to the question:

First of all, ancient prose has punctuation, such as:

In the "Hou Ma Meng Shu" of the Spring and Autumn Period, one or two short lines are used to indicate punctuation.

The short horizontal line circled in red above is the punctuation mark.

Han Ma Wang Dui Silk Book "Laozi":

The punctuation points are marked in blue circles. At this time, the punctuation system was already more complicated. In addition to the previous single and double short horizontal In addition, there are corner symbols, triangle symbols, dot symbols, square symbols, etc., and their usage is also different.

Tang Dynasty Lu Deming's "Classic Interpretations" (pictured is the Song Dynasty edition):

The pauses and periods here have basically taken their current form.

"Shang Shu Biao Annotation" of the Song Dynasty

The book uses circles, squares, black triangles, flat strips, semicircles and other patterns as punctuation.

The Ming Dynasty's "Cui Wei Lu"

The punctuation is similar to that of "Classic Interpretation", basically there are two types of pauses and periods, and circles are also used as emphasis marks.

"Yongle Dadian" of the Ming Dynasty:

Only the period (circle) is used as a punctuation mark, which is the small red circle in the picture.

In addition, there are punctuation methods that do not use symbols in classical Chinese, such as:

Space punctuation: spaces are used as punctuation, such as the Song version of "Huayang Guozhi":

Annotations and punctuation: use annotations as punctuations, that is, go to the entire sentence and then annotate, such as the Song version of "Selected Works of Liuchen Annotations"

Chinese character punctuation: use Chinese characters such as "Ju" and "Read" as punctuations Punctuation means adding the word "Ju" or "Read" after each sentence to break the sentence, such as the Qing Dynasty's "Interpretation of Sentence Reading in Four Books"

Of course, there were also a large number of books without punctuation in ancient times. For these books, often Specific methods are used to express punctuation. For example, repeated forms and neat sentences are used in "Poetry", "xi" is used to indicate the end of a sentence in "Sao", and rhymes, modal particles, etc. Teacher Fan Yanting has already explained in more detail , which will not be described in detail here. Note that these are not only methods of dividing sentences, but also issues that must be paid attention to when writing articles at that time. "Wen Xin Diao Long·Zhang Ju" talks about the problem of using function words to help readers break up sentences when writing articles: "The poet also used the word "xi" to enter the sentence limit, and "Chu Ci" used it, and the word came out of the sentence. Xunxi The words and sentences are used to support the remaining sounds. Shun's chant of "Southern Wind" has been used for a long time, but Wei Wufu is not good at it, so it is not beneficial to the literary meaning! As for "Fu Wei Gai Gu", he started singing it; The words "It comes to Yi" are the old style of Zhaju; the words "It's true" are also sent to the end of Changke. According to the matter, it is practical and practical. In addition, the help of one word is needed. It is difficult to make mistakes with foreign words, and it is impossible to make mistakes in chapters and sentences."

Of course, these methods still cannot solve all the problems, so there are many unsolved problems in ancient texts, such as "The Analects of Confucius." The first sentence of the chapter "Zi Han":

"Zi Han talks about profit, fate and benevolence". Should we conclude: "Zi rarely talks about profit, destiny and benevolence." Or "Zi rarely talks about profit." With fate and benevolence." Different explanations have always been proposed. When encountering these problems, you need to refer to many commentaries, combine your elementary school skills, and carefully identify them to understand their original meaning.

In fact, everyone should be able to see at this point that not only was there no punctuation in ancient China, but there were a large number of books with punctuation. The problem is that the system of punctuation is not unified. Almost every family uses its own system. You use circles and I use squares. You use solid ones and I use hollow ones. You mark on the left side of the text and I mark on the bottom of the text... and various other knowledge. Likewise, the problem lies in the lack of system. There is no system, so it cannot be spread and will be lost. 3. Why do Chinese classical Chinese texts have no punctuation marks?

Although the ancient books and articles did not have punctuation marks, they did have "jv dou" (jv dou). When private school teachers taught students, they used a red pen to break sentences, which improved the students' level. From now on, you can read the entire article without sentence reading. Generally speaking, people with some education have gradually adapted to this reading method. Even so, it did not affect the development of ancient culture, but it was not conducive to its popularization. For example, articles are segmented by the classical function words at the end of each sentence; parallel prose is segmented by antitheses; poetry rhythm is segmented by rhymes and music scores of the time.

I used to read different versions of the "Tao Te Ching" and other classical masterpieces, and there were different sentence fragmentation problems. At first, I didn't understand why this was the case, but now I finally understand - the ancient texts are all written in one sentence, and there is no need to When it comes to punctuation marks, please note that it’s not that they are absent, but that they are not used. “Without” and “without” are two different things. Why not? Because once the article is punctuated, the literary spirit is cut off, just as the human Qi of the three burners is originally unobstructed, but if the Qi is cut off, it will be stagnant and blocked. Articles are alive, they have vision and energy. Once the literary spirit is lost, the meaning of the article becomes stiff, and the article dies. I will never get tired of reading "The Analects" throughout my life. Every year I read it, I will understand it every year. Every time I read it, I will experience it every time. When the reading of a sentence changes, the entire meaning of the text changes drastically, so I can't stop it.

The basic principle of sentence reading is that "the absolute word is a sentence, and the utterance is the reading." The end of the mood is the "sentence", which is marked with a circle. The sentence that does not end is called "reading", which is marked with a dot. Mark, the ancients often used the word "remarkable" to praise the achievements of a certain historical figure.

The sentences are read incorrectly, often causing jokes and ambiguities. For example, during the movement to criticize Confucius, the phrase "the people can follow it, but cannot know it" from the Analects of Confucius was often used to describe things, saying that Confucius helped the autocratic emperor and implemented policies that kept the people ignorant. He also pulled Laozi over to accompany him, because there is a saying in "Laozi" that "the heart is empty, the belly is strong; the knowledge is weak, the bones are strong".

Confucius was a great educator. It was he who pushed education from the palaces of the nobility to the people, and only then could there be social education for later generations. This was Confucius's great contribution. Confucius taught without distinction and wanted to teach everyone clearly. If he wanted to "fool the people", who would he teach? This doesn't make any sense logically.

But why does this misunderstanding occur? Wrong sentence segmentation. Confucius' meaning is: if the people can do it, let it be done; if they can't do it, know it. If the common people understand the truth, let them go. Politicians should not look for trouble. If the common people do not understand the truth, they must educate them. This is the responsibility of the politicians. In the same way, if a child is obedient, parents should not be picky about this or that; if a child is disobedient, parents should educate him well. 4. When did punctuation marks appear (no punctuation marks in ancient texts)

In ancient times, articles were written without punctuation marks. It was very difficult to read and even caused misunderstandings. It was not until the Han Dynasty that "sentence reading" was invented. " symbol. A short paragraph with complete meaning is called "sentence"; a paragraph with unfinished meaning in the sentence and a pauseable tone is called "reading" (read, equivalent to the current comma). The Song Dynasty used ".", "," to indicate sentence reading. Personal names and place names only appeared in the Ming Dynasty. These are the earliest punctuation marks in our country. In 1919, the Preparatory Committee for the Unification of the Mandarin Language stipulated 12 types of symbols based on the original punctuation marks in my country and with reference to the punctuation marks common in various countries. At that time, the Ministry of Education promulgated the national regulations. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, the General Administration of Press further summarized the usage rules of punctuation marks and published "The Usage of Punctuation Marks" in 1951. In October of the same year, the Government Affairs Council issued the "Instructions on Learning the Usage of Punctuation Marks." Since then, , punctuation marks have become more perfect and have unified usage. In April 1990, the National Language Working Committee and the Press and Publication Administration revised and promulgated the "Usage of Punctuation Marks", which made new regulations and regulations on punctuation marks and their usage. illustrate..