Classical Chinese grammar
Classical Chinese grammar is the grammar of Classical Chinese, a term that first and foremost refers to the written language of the classical period of Chinese literature, from the end of the Spring and Autumn period to the end of the Han Dynasty. The term "Classical Chinese" is also often used for the higher language register used in writing during most of the following centuries ; however, this article focuses on the grammar used in the classical period.
The present article uses modern Mandarin character readings following common practice among scholars, even though it is also possible to read Classical Chinese using the literary readings of other modern Chinese varieties, or even using a reconstruction of character readings belonging to centuries past.
Compared to the written vernacular Chinese of today, the most notable difference is that Classical Chinese rarely uses words composed of two Chinese characters; nearly all words are written with one character only. This stands directly in contrast with vernacular Chinese, in which two-character words are extremely common. This phenomenon exists, in part, because as sound changes created homophones among words, compounding was used to resolve ambiguities.
Typological overview
Classical Chinese has been long noted for the absence of inflectional morphology: nouns and adjectives do not inflect for case, definiteness, gender, specificity or number; neither do verbs inflect for person, number, tense, aspect, telicity, valency, evidentiality or voice. However, in terms of derivational morphology, it makes use of compounding, reduplication and perhaps affixation, although not in a productive way. There is also an extensive use of zero-derivation.The basic constituent order of Classical Chinese is subject-verb-object, but is not fully consistent: there are particular situations where the VS and OV word orders appear. Topic-and-comment constructions are often used. Neither a topic, nor the subject nor objects are mandatory, being often dropped when their meaning is understood, and copular sentences often do not have a verb.
Within a noun phrase, demonstratives, quantifying determiners, adjectives, possessors and relative clauses precede the head noun, while cardinal numbers can appear before or after the noun they modify. Within a verb phrase, adverbs usually appear before a verb. The language, as analyzed in this article, uses coverbs and postpositions. Classical Chinese makes heavy use of parataxis where English would use a dependent clause; however, there are means to form dependent clauses, some of which appear before the main clause while others appear after. There are also a number of sentence-final particles.
Two simple coordinated nouns can be joined with a conjunction, but this is not always the case. This, combined with the fact that two nouns in a possessor-possessed construction are not always marked for their functions either, can lead to ambiguity: 山林 shān lín could mean either "mountains and forests" or "the forest of a mountain".
With the absence of inflectional morphology, Classical Chinese is largely a zero-marking language, except that possessors and relative clauses are usually dependent-marked with a grammatical particle.
Negation is achieved by placing a negative particle before the verb. Yes-no questions are marked with a sentence-final particle, while wh-questions are marked with in-situ interrogative pronouns. There are a number of passive constructions, but passives are sometimes not marked differently from active constructions, at least when written.
The lexicon of Classical Chinese has been traditionally divided into two large categories: content words and function words. Scholars of Classical Chinese grammar notably disagree on how to further divide these two categories exactly, but a classification using word classes similar to those of Latin has been common.
Word class flexibility
- noun used as verb: 順流而 shùnliú ér dōng yě; lit: "along the river the east", i.e. "boating along the river to row to the east"
- noun used as adverbial: quǎn zuò yú qián; lit: "a dog is sitting here", i.e. " is sitting here like a dog"
- verb used as noun : 乘 chéng bēn yùfēng; lit: "take ride or take the wind", i.e. "take a runaway horse or take the wind"
- verb used as adverbial : zhēng gēdì; lit: "fight to cede territory", i.e. "cede territory akin to a race"
- adjective used as noun: shèng yì shèng; lit: "wise become wiser", i.e. "the wise person becomes wiser"
- adjective used as verb: 勝地不 shèngdì bù cháng; lit: "a good place not long", i.e. "a good place does not last forever"
- adjective used as adverbial: báifèi; lit: "vain cost", i.e. "cost... in vain'''"
Verbs
; Yidong usage
In classical Chinese, it is common for a noun or adjective to be used as a verb or an adjective, and most of these cases involve a yidong usage of verbs. One peculiarity is that a word that is originally a verb does not share the usage. In addition, there is a slight difference in meaning between the noun and the adjective in this usage.
For a noun, it means "consider... as + ". For instance:
- '
Semantic translation: The father considered the thing beneficial.
For an adjective, it means "consider... + ". For instance：
- '
Semantic translation: The fisherman considers the thing very strange.
; Shidong usage
In this case, nouns, verbs and adjectives share the usage, with different meanings.
For a noun, it means "make... + ". For instance:
Semantic translation: the person who defeated the Qin Dynasty and entered Xianyang would be made a king.
For a verb, it could mean "make... + do/done/to do", depending on the sentence. For instance:
Semantic translation: made the widow in a lonely boat cry.
For an adjective, it means "make... + ". For instance:
- 既來之，則
Semantic translation: Since you have been here, make yourself calm here.
; Weidong usage
The following examples demonstrate weidong usage of verbs. Such usage may occur:
- to express a motion that is based on a purpose. For instance:
- to express a motion that due to a particular reason. For instance:
- to help the object do something. For instance:
- to execute a motion to the object. For instance:
Pronouns
- Personal, e.g. 汝 rǔ 'you'
- Demonstrative: 此 cǐ, 斯 sī, 兹 zī 'this, these'; 彼 bǐ, 夫 fú 'that, those'; 是 shì ' this, that'
- Reciprocal: 彼此 bǐcǐ 'each other'
- Reflexive: 己 jǐ
- Interrogative: 誰 shuí 'who'; 孰 shú 'who, which'; 何 hé 'what; why, how'; 曷 hé 'when; what'; 奚 xī, 胡 hú 'where, how, why'; 盍 hé 'why not'; 安 ān, 焉 yān 'where, how'.
| Personal pronouns | |
| 1st person | 吾 wú, 我 wǒ, 余 yú, 予 yú |
| 2nd person | 爾 ěr, 汝/女 rǔ, 而 ér, 若 ruò |
| 3rd person | 之 zhī, 其 qí |
Classical Chinese did not distinguish number in some of its pronouns, for example, 我 wǒ could mean either 'I, me' or 'we, us'. The language did not have a special 3rd-person personal pronoun that could be used in subject position, but the distal demonstrative 彼 bǐ 'that, those' and the anaphoric demonstrative 是 shì frequently take that role.