Chinese Dialect of Hunan Dialect

The distribution of Chinese in Hunan Province is complex, with Xiang dialect and Mandarin as the main languages, followed by Gan dialect and Hakka dialect, and dialects with unclear attribution (including Pinghua and Xiang dialect). Yang Shifeng, a famous linguist, believes that Hengyang, Chenzhou and Yongzhou in southern Hunan (known as Hengyang, Chenzhou and Lingling respectively before the 1980s) are often called "southern Hunan". This area borders Jiangxi Province in the east, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in the west and Guangdong Province in the south. Among them, there are many counties and cities in Yongzhou and Chenzhou, including Lingling, lengshuitan, Dong 'an, Shuangpai, Daoxian, Ningyuan, Jiangyong, Jianghua, Xintian and Lanshan 10 in Yongzhou, and Guiyang, Jiahe, Yizhang, Linwu, Rucheng and Zixing in Chenzhou.

Representative dialects: First, the dialect area represented by Zixingsa (Bai Shuo), including Yongxing, Guidong, Rucheng, Anren and other places, is a mixture of southern Hunan dialect and Hakka Gan dialect. Second, the Xiangnan dialect bilingual area represented by Jiahe dialect, including Yizhang, Linwu, Jiahe, Guiyang, Lanshan and Ningyuan, is a bilingual area that uses both Xiangnan dialect and Southwest Mandarin. Thirdly, lengshuitan, Lingling, Dong 'an, Shuangpai, Daozhou, Xintian, Jiangyong and Jianghua, which retain many features of Xiang dialect, are closely related to Peiping dialect in Guangxi. Tujia language (pi? tsi？ Sa? ) belongs to the Tujia branch of Sino-Tibetan language family. In Tujia language, Tujia people call themselves skin? tsi？ k？ Answer? [Bizka]. According to the data provided by Dr. Yang Zaibiao in April, 201/,Tujia language is still used in 200 administrative villages, 34 townships and 500 natural villages in western Hunan. Tujia language is divided into two dialects: North and South. The differences in phonology, grammar and vocabulary between the northern and southern Tujia languages are too great to communicate. Tujia northern dialect, also called Biji, used to be the mother tongue of most Tujia people. But now, many Tujia people's mother tongue has been changed to the local popular Chinese dialect (southwest mandarin) in northwest Hunan, and only a few Tujia people's mother tongue is Tujia northern dialect.

Longshan dialect

Longshan County: Car Wash River Town, Miaoertan Town, Yindifang Town, Taluo Township, Ganxi Township, Mengqian Township, Fengxi Town, Pojiao Township, Tasha Township, Neixi Township, Jiashi Township Yongshun County: Duishan Township, Heping Township, Xiqi Township, Shouche Township and Shaoha Township Baojing County: Purong Town, Ren Xian Township and Guzhang County of Tuzha Township.

Longshan County: Longtou Town, Yanchong Township, Changtan Township and Liye Town Baojing County: Longtou Township, Bier Township, Mawang Township, Bamao Town, Angdong Township, Longxi Township and Jibo Township.

Monz dialect

The southern dialect of Tujia language is also called Mengzi dialect. Mengzi dialect is an island of Tujia dialect in Miao Yao and Chinese-speaking areas. Since ancient times, there are only a few indigenous people (only a few hundred people use them now), who are distributed in nine villages and seven villages (alias Jiuzhai dialect) in Tanxi Town, luxi county, and there are also a small number of migrants in Tanxi Town. The specific name of the village is (in brackets, the place name is Monz):

Xia du (ts? ie？ bu？ ) lying bamboo (p? u？ dz？ ) Boluo Zhai (Bo? lo？ Cai? ) and has been (ts? Answer? d？ Me? ) and yourself (ts? Answer? d？ Me? Answer? di？ ) large wave current (ts? ie？ d？ p？ o？ ) Xiaolingzhai (ts? ie？ Sa? ) Li Muzhai (Li? Mu? Cai? ) Tumazhai (T Ma? Cai? ) Tanxi Town (Hu? d？ The reason for the formation of Xiang dialect is that the northern Han people went south to Hunan to develop independently and were influenced by the southern minority languages. Although Xiang dialect has a very long history in Hunan, ethnic minorities in Hunan have always been the main ethnic members in this area. Chinese was first spread in central Hunan, and the Chinese around Hunan was later spread from here.

Zhao Tuo, king of South Vietnam, once said, "There is Changsha in the northwest, and its semi-barbarians are also kings". In 8 AD, Wang Mang usurped the throne and renamed Changsha "Tuman County", which shows that the ethnic minorities in Hunan were very powerful at that time. Specifically, the Han nationality in Qin and Han dynasties mainly distributed in three areas: Shui Yuan with Changde as the center and the middle and lower reaches of Lishui; The middle and lower reaches of Xiangjiang River with Changsha as the center; The Hunan-Jiangxi border reaches the narrow strip of Guangdong Province. In addition, the vast hinterland of the whole Hunan region is still inhabited by ethnic groups who used Miao and Yao languages in ancient times, without development and colonization, and there may be some scattered immigrants from China. (Li Lan 1994). In the late Tang Dynasty, after Liu Yuxi was relegated to Wuling, an article said: "On the coast of xiang yuan, the weather is cold and hot, geese arrive, and Chinese words are rare." (Full Tang Wen (Volume 603) The Book of Situ in Shangdu) shows that there were a large number of non-Han areas in Xiangjiang River and Yuanjiang River basins at that time, and Chinese was rarely heard. The climate in Hunan is warm and fertile, and it is relatively convenient for Han people to migrate from their original place of residence to the surrounding areas. Therefore, this gradual spread of immigration movement has never stopped. Tan Qixiang analyzed the historical data of clans in Shaoyang, Xinhua, Wugang, Xinning, Chengbu, Xiangyin and Jingzhou, and thought that "there are 55 clans in Hunan Province, which are second only to Jiangxi and surpass other provinces, with dense territory and convenient migration, which is a natural phenomenon." (Tan Qixiang 1987:325)

Xiang dialect in Xinhua and Anhua areas in southwest Hunan probably spread in the Song Dynasty. "Mei cave pretty, old don't meet China. Its land is connected to Tan in the east, Shao in the south, Chen in the west, Ding and Li in the north, and Meishan is among them. ..... Xining five years, hence Meishan, Mao Yu. ..... Zhao put Xinhua County in a deep mountain (Article 250 of Volume 494 of Biography of the History of the Song Dynasty)

The Xiang dialect in Nanxian County, northwest Hunan Province was only formed during the Republic of China. At the end of the Qing Dynasty, on the north bank of Dongting Lake, the sediment carried by the Yangtze River water to Dongting Lake was deposited into a big delta. These fertile land attracted many immigrants from the province. However, the sources of immigrants are chaotic, and each speaks its own native dialect. By the time of the Republic of China, there were still no dialects with special internal status to be popularized and no dialects with consistent external status to be imitated. But the people who moved here are generally from Yiyang, Changsha, Yueyang, Changde and Hengyang. Yiyang has the largest population, and the "Yiyang style" is obvious. (Zhang Weiran 1995: 73) So, today Nanxian Xiang dialect is also the closest to Yiyang Xiang dialect.

Chinese dialects in remote areas of Hunan Province spread late and were first assimilated and covered by Southwest Mandarin, a powerful dialect from outside the province. When the dialects around Hunan were replaced by other dialects to varying degrees, the typical Xiang dialect remained in the middle of Hunan. The dialects of Changsha, Xiangtan, Zhuzhou, Hengyang, Loudi and other big cities in central Hunan will form their own centripetal force. The dialect advantage brought by this geographical advantage will also make the dialect in the core area of Hunan continue to consolidate its position. However, in a core city like Changsha, due to the frequent flow of people and the strong influence of foreign dialects, dialects change faster than other parts of Central China. However, the sense of dialect superiority formed by its own geographical advantages has not changed as fast as the dialects around Hunan. There are two reasons for the formation of southwest mandarin: first, the northern Han people went south and foreign soldiers were stationed; The second is the natural communication between Hunan and Guizhou, Guangxi and other border areas. The northern Han people went south to Hunan mainly through garrison and refugees. When the foreign northern dialect called Putonghua becomes a strong dialect for local communication, it may replace the local dialect or minority languages. In Yongzhou, Chenzhou and other places in Hunan, there is still bilingualism, that is, the cities are basically covered by Putonghua and there are no local dialects. But in rural areas, even in remote counties like Jiangyong, dialects have been preserved, forming a bilingual life in which dialects and Putonghua coexist. In fact, the Mandarin that directly affects Hunan dialect passes through the Southwest Mandarin in the west and south of Hunan. This is the result of direct communication between ordinary people. Because Mandarin is easier to understand and more popular, people will gradually switch to Mandarin automatically.

As early as the Qin Dynasty, the northern army entered Hunan. In 22 1 year BC, Qin Shihuang sent troops to Hunan. "Huainanzi Human Training" records: He "made Wei Tusui lose 500,000 troops as five armies, one army blocked Chengling (now Jingzhou, Hunan), and the other army defended the nine-barrel blockade (now Ningyuan, Hunan) ... for three years." Later, it was recorded that Emperor Han Ming sent troops to Hunan. Article 76 of the Book of the Later Han Dynasty, The Biography of Nanman and Southwest Aliens, records that in the early years of the Eastern Han Dynasty, after the martial branch of Wuling was settled, "Wuling stopped stationing troops and gave different rewards." Liu Chuan, a history of the Yuan Dynasty, records: "In Song Dynasty, voters set up cars to avoid the corvee and make it imperial. In Li, it is called Aiding; In Chen, it is called camping. Wu Song, it's all ruined. Guo Jie learned to come back. " . It reached its peak in the Ming Dynasty. At that time, there were "state military and political organs guarding all directions", and the soldiers managed by the organs generally came from other places. Go to the battlefield in case of war and farm at ordinary times. (Tan Qixiang 1987:322)

These soldiers have lived in the stationed areas for a long time. If they are in a weak language, their language may be assimilated by the local language. "The elders in the border town are old neighbors, and it is easy to ask why during the holidays. Qing' an resigned from his hometown, and his ancestors were still known. The clothes are still old Tang style, childish and new Chu language. " (Xuan Jing's Collected Works, Volume 8, "Those who join the army when they meet their hometown elders in Guoyuan House, and those who know more about their hometown are endowed with this") It can be seen that the descendants of soldiers have been assimilated by the local "Chu language".

If the language of these soldiers is a strong language, they may keep their Mandarin. Daoguang's Yongzhou Fuzhi quoted the old local chronicles as saying: "Counties talk in the countryside and listen to each other. Many people sometimes say that they are like running water, and men, women and children are used to it, but they regard Putonghua as a way to make mistakes. However, the language of aristocratic children and guards is clear, and they are not like tongues. "

Since the Han Dynasty, most feudal dynasties have established their capitals in the Central Plains. As a result, the scourge of the Central Plains War was triggered everywhere, and the people were displaced and began to seek a place to live in the south. Tan Qixiang said (1987:30 1): "People from the Central Plains began to move into Hunan in large numbers. Hunan was developed by people from the Central Plains at the beginning, which led to a new start later. At that time, the Central Plains was in chaos, the countryside was filled with smoke, and it was a thousand miles away. People have no livelihood. There must be people from Nanyang and Xiangyang counties who fled south between Dongting, Yuan and Hunan, and the road shine on you, in order to open up this desolate and uninhabited mountain forest. " According to the records of the Continued Han Dynasty, from AD 2 to AD 140 (Yonghe five years), the number of households in Changsha increased five times and the population increased four times. The number of households in Lingling County has increased nine times and the population has increased six times. The number of households in Guiyang County has quadrupled and the population has tripled. The number of households and population in Wuling County has increased by more than 30%. But in 140 years, the number of households and population in China decreased by 20%. It can be seen that the rapid population growth in Hunan at that time was not a natural growth, but had a lot to do with immigrants from the north.

Historians generally believe that the first climax of the large-scale southward migration of the Central Plains began with the "Yongjia funeral" in the late Western Jin Dynasty. At that time, Jiangnan was relatively stable, and many Zhongyuan people took refuge in the Yangtze River. "Luo Jing capsized, and Zhongzhou women avoided the chaos of Jiangzuo." (Biography of Wang Dao in the Book of Jin) In order to appease people's hearts, the rulers of the Eastern Jin Dynasty once set up administrative regions and arranged immigrants according to the origins of the gentry and the people. At that time, Jiangsu received the most immigrants from the Central Plains, followed by Anhui, followed by Hubei, Sichuan, southern Henan, northwestern Shaanxi and northern Shandong. But in Hunan, there are few immigrants from the north because they are far away from the Central Plains (Tan Qixiang 1987:2 1 1). According to the Records of Counties in Song Dynasty and Geography in Jin Dynasty, there was a county in the south of Yiyang and half a county in the south of Hedong in the northern immigrant area established at that time. This migration should have impacted the ancient Xiang dialect in Dongting Lake area and gradually formed the official dialect in Changde area.

The second great migration occurred after the "An Shi Rebellion" in the Tang Dynasty. "Old Tang Book Geography" records that "since the end of Germany, there have been many reasons in the Central Plains, and both Deng people are dressed in clothes, and they all cast their clothes in Jiangxiang, so Jingnan Jingyi is ten times earlier". This shows that in the middle of the Tang Dynasty, from Jingzhou, Hubei Province to Changde, Hunan Province, the number of registered permanent residence increased by 10 times due to immigration. Wei Zhuang, a poet at the end of the Tang Dynasty, also said in Hunan Works: "Chu doesn't know about the Qin rebellion, and southerners blame northerners." The migration of northern residents is large in scale, large in number and relatively concentrated in the region, which makes their language not only difficult to be assimilated by the local indigenous language, but also has a huge impact on the local indigenous language. This strengthened the foundation of Changde dialect. Zhou He You Rujie also said: "Such a large number of immigrants will inevitably bring a huge impact to the northern dialect, making the northern dialect replace the inherent dialects in the Lishui River Basin and the lower reaches of the Yuanshui River. The foundation of Putonghua in Changde area may be laid at this time. " Later, in the Song Dynasty, after 300 years of development, "the northern dialect finally gradually expanded from north to south to the whole Yuanli River basin." (Zhou, You Rujie 1985)

The southward movement of northern Chinese also impacted the minority languages in the south. The relatively advanced productive forces and culture in the Central Plains prompted ethnic residents to consciously learn from them. Liu Yuxi once described in the poem "Fifty Rhymes of Wuling Shu Huai" that when he was demoted to Langzhou (now Changde), "all the neighbors moved to other places, and the children learned to tell their last words". Geography of Sui Shu describes the "barbarians" at that time. "Those who live with Xia people are no different; Those who live in the valley are unspeakable, and their hobbies are completely different. "

Due to the lack of documentary records, we can't know when the Mandarin in southern China was formed. Zhang Weiran (1995: 66-67) believed that the southern Hunan Mandarin was related to the garrison in the Song and Ming Dynasties and began to spread among the army and the government. To be sure, at least in the Qing Dynasty, a considerable number of people began to use Putonghua, because some local chronicles from the Qing Dynasty to the Republic of China clearly recorded that Putonghua could be used. For example, Guangxu's "Xingning County Records" records that "there are many people in China, and there are also rural talks". Daoguang's Yongzhou Fuzhi: "It's Mandarin, which is easy to understand. If it is different, it will be mixed on all sides, with different words, different voices and various types. " According to the Records of Jianghua County, Tongzhi of Qing Dynasty, "Yi He Jinghuai said: Jiang Yi speaks Mandarin and knows Xiao Yi. There are many differences, different words and different sounds. "

The foreign Mandarin in Hunan Province will inevitably affect the formation of Hunan Mandarin. Zhou and You Rujie (1985) believe that southern Hunan Mandarin comes from Guangxi. "A northward Jingzhou, combined with the influence of Hubei, made Jingxian dialect mandarin, and made Huitong, Tongdao and Qianyang dialects have the characteristics of northern Hunan dialect. The other branch entered southern Hunan from west to east, and contacted and blended with Xiang dialect and Gan dialect, forming a mixed situation of several dialects. " Fan (2000) also thinks that the Southern Hunan Mandarin appeared late, and it can only enter southern Hunan from southwest after the late Ming Dynasty. Judging from Chenzhou City, Mandarin first entered Guiyang County of Chenzhou City from the west through Yongzhou City, Hunan Province, then spread eastward to Chenzhou and Chenxian County, and then spread southward to Linwu, Yizhang and even northern Guangdong. "

In a word, Putonghua is distributed in remote areas of western Hunan and southern Hunan, and it is difficult to penetrate into the core areas of central Hunan. Why is it easy to form Putonghua in western and southern Hunan? First, there is no consistent unofficial dialect in these areas, and it is difficult for any inherent dialect to become a strong dialect. Secondly, there is an urgent need for an easy-to-circulate Mandarin as a regional dialect between regions with a large number of inherent dialects and complex features. Thirdly, the strong dialect in the periphery of these areas is Mandarin, and people will naturally communicate with people from Guizhou and Guangxi outside Hunan Province, so it is necessary to master and naturally learn Mandarin spoken in these areas. Regarding the formation of Gan dialect in Hunan, Zhou Heyou Rujie (1985) thinks that it is the result of a large number of Jiangxi immigrants entering Hunan. Zhang Weiran (1995: 66-67) gave a further demonstration. There is a saying in history that "Jiangxi fills the lake". If the immigrants in Hunan mainly came from the north before the Tang Dynasty, they mainly came from the East after the Five Dynasties. "Jiangxi and Hunan are in the same place, and there are no mountains and rivers. The migration from dense to sparse naturally occurs. Therefore, Jiangxi people's development of Hunan has little political background and is purely automatic economic development. " (Tan Qixiang 1987:32 1) It can be seen that the formation of Gan dialect is related to natural migration, but there is no reason for political asylum.

According to Tan Qixiang's research, 22 ethnic groups migrated to Hunan, Xiangyin 18, Baoqingfu (now Shaoyang) 4, Xinhua 3, Wugang 1 (Tan Qixiang 1987:339) in the Five Dynasties. There were many Jiangxi immigrants in Hunan in the Song Dynasty. "Most of these Jiangxi people moved in from Longxingfu (now Nanchang City) and Jizhou (now Ji 'an City), mainly from Xiushui-Miluo River Basin in the north to Dongting Lake Plain, from Xianggan Avenue in the middle section of Zhejiang-Jiangxi Line to Tanzhou (now Changsha City) and Shaozhou (now Shaoyang City), and to Youjiang-Leishui River Basin in the south. (Ge et al.1993: 315-316) Volume 250 of Records of Ming Taizu records the thirty years of Hongwu (1397). "People in Wuling County of Changde say that since Shen Bing, there have been constant wars in ten counties such as Wuling, and people have fled. Although they have resumed business, the land is vast. There are many unemployed people in the counties around Jiangxi, begging Jiangxi to move the poor to farm, so that ordinary farmers can make the best use of the land according to their abilities. Shang Yue said that he ordered the Ministry of Housing to send officials to Jiangxi to distribute more people and those without property to farm on their land. "

Zhou Heyou Rujie (1985) summarized several characteristics of Jiangxi people's migration to Hunan. First, Jiangxi immigrants decrease from northeast Hunan to southwest, northwest and southeast, which is directly proportional to the distance between northern and central Jiangxi. Therefore, the Gan dialect films in Hunan are naturally close to Jiangxi, and the characteristics of Gan dialect in the north are more obvious than those in the south. Secondly, the starting point of Jiangxi immigrants is relatively concentrated, mainly in Taihe, Ji 'an, Jishui, Anfu, Nanchang and Fengcheng counties. This is related to the development level of various parts of Jiangxi Province. These six highly developed counties have no idle land, but if there are idle people, they will naturally find a way out for immigrants. However, the southern part of Jiangxi itself is relatively underdeveloped, and naturally it will not immigrate to Hunan. Third, the immigrants from northern Hunan come from northern Jiangxi, and the immigrants from southern Hunan come from central Jiangxi. This leads to the differences between Gan dialect in northern Hunan and Gan dialect in southern Hunan. Fourthly, during the 700-odd years from Tang Dynasty to Song Dynasty and then to Yuan Dynasty, Jiangxi immigrants have been increasing. First of all, Gan dialect was formed in eastern Hunan at the border of Hunan and Jiangxi. Later generations of immigrants crossed this area and went deep into the southwest border of Hunan, from Xiangyin to Ningxiang to Xinhua to Suining.

There are also a large number of records of Jiangxi immigrants in local chronicles. For example, Kangxi's Liuyang County Records Collection records: "Liu Xian aborigines, within a short distance, have nine guests, from the north and south of the river." "Liling Local Records" of the Republic of China records: "There are many ethnic groups living in the county, and they were all tourists hundreds of years ago. ..... Liling is close to Jiangxi, so the surname is also from Jiangxi. "

Some historical records can also show that the Gan dialect in Hunan did not seem to be fully formed in the Song Dynasty. Liu Kezhuang, a poet of the Southern Song Dynasty, once said: "There are many Chu dialects in the city." This shows that the gap between Liling dialect and Pingxiang dialect in the Southern Song Dynasty is still very obvious. At that time, Liling still spoke "Chu dialect", that is, Xiang dialect, and Gan dialect was not fully formed. Hakka generally moved to Hunan from Guangdong, Fujian or Jiangxi during the Ming and Qing Dynasties, and generally moved in families. (Lidong Chen, July 33, 2003) According to the records of genealogy in various places, Hakkas first entered Hunan in the Song Dynasty, and from the Ming Dynasty to the Qing Dynasty, Hakkas migrated in large numbers. For example, a branch of the Huang family at the mouth of Chaling River, whose ancestors migrated from Ganzhou, Jiangxi Province in 1 184 (the decade of Southern Song Dynasty). The earliest Hakka ancestors in Pingjiang County migrated from Longchuan, Guangdong Province in 1472 (the seventh year of Chenghua in the Ming Dynasty). During the period from Shunzhi to Qianlong in Qing Dynasty, Hakkas moved to Pingjiang from Meizhou, Huizhou, Tai Po, Pingyuan, Jiaoling and Lechang. Most of the ancestors of Liuyang Hakkas came from the Tingjiang River valley in northeast Guangdong and west Fujian, mainly from the plains, Xingning, Meizhou and other counties and cities in Guangdong. In the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, Hakka people in Fujian moved to Liling on a large scale, and Hakka people in Guangdong moved to Rucheng. Hakka immigrants in Yanling County mainly came from Qing Dynasty.

Hakka people generally enter Hunan for three reasons. First, the "shed people" in Jiangxi were forced to move because of official arrest. According to Liling County Records (1948), Hakkas "study hard, advocate martial arts, work together with men and women, and live in sheds, so they are called shed people. In the Ming Dynasty, he often rallied bravely, wrapped his head in a red scarf, and responded to Zheng Chenggong and Jin Shenghuan in an attempt to regain his vitality. ..... Honest officials are naturally going to shed people, and after they are killed, they are thrown out. The shed people are not allowed to live in Yichun and are scattered in neighboring counties. " Second, coastal residents were forced to move because of war harassment. According to "Liling County Records (1948)", "During the Shunzhi period, Zheng Chenggong invaded and plundered coastal counties many times. The Qing soldiers couldn't win, but they ordered the coastal people to move to the mainland and burn all the utensils to get rid of the nails, iron, oil, nitrate, millet and silk used by Zheng Haichuan. The people of Fujian and Guangdong have broken through and come from thousands of miles. " Third, the government guides immigrants to open up wasteland in Hunan. In the late Ming and early Qing dynasties, China suffered frequent wars, resulting in a sharp drop in population. According to "Records of Youxian County during Tongzhi Period", "There was a mutiny in the late Ming Dynasty, and the people fled to the fields." The government "attracts reclamation and it is difficult to cover the amount." In order to recuperate and encourage entrepreneurial production, a large number of Hakkas moved to Hunan to start businesses.

In a word, the distribution area of Hakka dialects in Hunan is not large. Because the Hakkas moved to Hunan late, and most of them moved in family style, Hakka dialect did not form a large-scale distribution in Hunan, but was scattered in several counties and cities. Local dialects include "local dialect" and "Pinghua" in southern Hunan and "local accent" in western Hunan. At present, there is not enough systematic research on the formation process of these dialects in academic circles, but it can be preliminarily affirmed that these dialects are various because of their remote geographical location and very closed traffic, which not only have the characteristics of early Xiang dialect, but also have many special variations caused by language contact.

Liang Min and Zhang Junru (1999) believe that Pinghua "is a kind of Chinese dialect which is gradually formed by the exchange and integration of different dialects of immigrants from Guilin, Liuzhou and Nanning, and influenced by Zhuang and Dong languages. Let's call it ancient Pinghua. More than a thousand years before Mandarin and Cantonese dialects entered Guangxi, Guping dialect was the main communication language of people in southern Hunan, northern Guangxi and southern Guangxi, and it was also the official language, cultural language, educational language and commercial language at that time. " Li Dongxiang (2006) thought that Xiangnan dialect was the result of the historical precipitation of Han immigrants in different periods and the interaction with local indigenous peoples, and it was basically completed in the Song Dynasty. Bao Houxing (2004) thinks that the formation of southern Hunan dialect is very complicated. First, the southern Hunan dialect area is located in Wuling Mountain area, and the geographical situation is very complicated. Second, the situation of immigrants in past dynasties is complicated. Third, frequent contact with local ethnic minorities is very complicated. Fourth, clan influence is complex.

From the perspective of immigration history, from Han Dynasty to modern times, southeastern Hunan accepted a large number of immigrants. From the perspective of genealogy, most of them came from Jiangxi, which is not essentially different from other areas in Hunan. Therefore, the formation of southern Hunan dialect can not be explained only from the immigration situation. And judging from the language features, some of them are quite old. For example, in ancient times, the initials of contentment were all voiced, but in Jiangyong Taochuan dialect, the word "tree" was called "wood", which shows that there were historical deposits in different periods. Some of them are strange. For example, from the personal pronoun in Dadiling dialect (Peng Zerun 2002), there is almost no corresponding relationship between it and ordinary Chinese dialects. This shows that in the historical process of language contact, it is likely to be influenced by minority languages. In many places, different ethnic surnames speak different dialects, indicating the background of family immigration. Remote and complicated geographical conditions caused traffic congestion, and large-scale spread was limited by geographical conditions, eventually forming a large number of different dialects with small circulation.

Xiangxi dialect is mainly distributed in Yuanling, Chenxi and Xupu in Huaihua City and Luxi and Guzhang in Xiangxi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture. These counties are originally remote, rural dialects are only distributed in remote mountainous areas with relatively closed traffic, and Putonghua or Xiang dialect is widely used in towns.

According to the textual research of Yang Wei (1999: 2-3), the area where this dialect is distributed was once an active area of ethnic minorities in history. People at that time were called "Five Creeks Men". As early as 202 BC (the fifth year of Emperor Gaozu), Yuanling County was established, which belonged to Wuling County. Therefore, Han people have a long history of moving here. In the Biography of Nanman Yi Xi in the later Han Dynasty, it was noted: "The Jin Ji of Gambao says that Wuling, Changsha, Lushan County, and the place where you were buried, are mixed with five streams." During the Qin and Han dynasties, the central government once conquered here in order to pacify it. In 49 AD (the 24th year of Jianwu of Emperor Guangwu of Han Dynasty), Ma Yuan, the general of Fu Bo, "recruited more than 40,000 people from twelve counties to levy five streams ..." According to "New Moon Man" written by Cui Moqi, "Ma Liubing has ten people" and "every 200 households are married and then sent to more than 300 households". In the Tang Dynasty, Youyang Za also recorded that "there were more than ten soldiers of Ma who did not return and married each other, with more than 200 households". During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, Yuanling, Luxi and Chenxi were now military strongholds. At that time, a large number of Han Chinese came here with the army, so the cause of culture and education was once very developed. In the year of Song San, the government stationed troops in Mingxikou, Yuanling, and distributed them to soldiers in Tian era for farming. Yuan Shizu opened a post road from Kyoto to Yunnan, and set up a post station along the way. At that time, there were stations in Yuanling, Chenxi and Luxi, such as Jiejie (with the word "pavilion"), Madi and western Sichuan. This has promoted the circulation of commodities and attracted a number of immigrants from Zhejiang, Fujian and Jiangxi. From the Ming Dynasty to the Yuan Dynasty, the government continued to station troops, allowing soldiers to farm for generations and absorb immigrants. According to 1874 (the 12th year of Tongzhi in Qing Dynasty), the Records of Yuanling County edited by Shou Zhong recorded: "The mountains and rivers in the four counties are steep, so since the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, deserters from other provinces have migrated here. Today, it is said that the aborigines are from Jiangxi, and there are also many naturalized people in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Henan, Shanxi and Shaanxi provinces. " According to the genealogy, some of the most popular surnames in rural dialect areas are from other provinces, mainly from Jiangxi.

These historical features are similar to the southern Hunan dialect, which is the result of the independent maintenance and development of immigrant languages after contacting with the local languages in this remote geographical location of mountainous areas. Originally, it is not surprising that these dialects are so localized, but it is strange to refer to Putonghua in these two regions.