# Which dialect is more ancient?



## eastlife

My friend and I brought up an arguement, which was quite funny. 

He thinks Fujianese is the most ancient dialect. Some people believe Fujianese is exactly the same as the official language in Tang dynasty. But it's not proved.

I think Cantonese is ancient, because the Cantonese words and grammar are more concise and....I do not know how to say, the word order of Cantonese looks very much like old time Chinese.

My colleagues do not agree with me. They think the major culture has been developed and spread from middle land of China, containing provinces of Henan河南, Shanxi山西, Shanxi陕西.So their dialects should be as ancient as their culture. But others think the northern provinces were greatly influenced by Mongolian and Manchrian in Yuan Dynasty and Qing Dynasty.

What do you think?


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## agliagli

Including some of the ethnic minorities's language ?  

Agli


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## eastlife

all the minorities' languages seem ancient, but they are not more wide spread. What I heard is the native Manchurian speakers are no more than 100.


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## agliagli

I do not think that a language, even if not "widespread", should not be taken in consideration in terms of "oldness" (sorry for my phrasing)... I've seen someone who quoted Max Weinreich "_a shprakh iz a dialekt mit an armey un flot"_ (= a language is a dialect with an army and a navy), and I think it is pretty much the same with Chinese ethnical minorities's dialects. Now, I would not be able to say which of them are the oldest. As for the diverse languages among the Han-group, I do not know either. Need some research...


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## samanthalee

eastlife said:


> My friend and I brought up an arguement, which was quite funny.
> 
> He thinks Fujianese is the most ancient dialect. Some people believe Fujianese is exactly the same as the official language in Tang dynasty. But it's not proved.
> 
> I think Cantonese is ancient, because the Cantonese words and grammar are more concise and....I do not know how to say, the word order of Cantonese looks very much like old time Chinese.
> 
> My colleagues do not agree with me. They think the major culture has been developed and spread from middle land of China, containing provinces of Henan河南, Shanxi山西, Shanxi陕西.So their dialects should be as ancient as their culture. But others think the northern provinces were greatly influenced by Mongolian and Manchrian in Yuan Dynasty and Qing Dynasty.
> 
> What do you think?


 
When you say "Fujianese", you mean "Min", the language spoken in Taiwan?


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## Lugubert

To have an even remotely meaningful discussion on this question, we need to find a means of measuring ancientness. I find it an impossible venture.

Some people promote Latvian as the most ancient of today's Indo-European languages, others vehemently argue for Hindi. Nobody ever proposes a measure to defend their claims.


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## vince

Fujian is home to the Min language.

The Min language is divided into three dialects as mutually unintelligible as the German dialects: Northern Min, Central Min, and Southern Min (Min Nan).

The prestige subdialect of Central Min is Fuzhou-hua. Min Nan is the dialect of the Min language that is the most widespread: it is spoken in Chaozhou in Guangdong, parts of Malaysia and Singapore, and Taiwan (where it is known as Taiwanese).

Min is a fairly conservative language, because it keeps most of the consonant finals and tones. What is definitely not conservative is Mandarin.


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## samanthalee

vince said:


> Fujian is home to the Min language.
> 
> The Min language is divided into three dialects as mutually unintelligible as the German dialects: Northern Min, Central Min, and Southern Min (Min Nan).
> 
> The prestige subdialect of Central Min is Fuzhou-hua. Min Nan is the dialect of the Min language that is the most widespread: it is spoken in Chaozhou in Guangdong, parts of Malaysia and Singapore, and Taiwan (where it is known as Taiwanese).
> 
> Min is a fairly conservative language, because it keeps most of the consonant finals and tones. What is definitely not conservative is Mandarin.


 
Oh, I didn't know there are Min subdialects..in that case, even if it is agreed that Min is the most ancient dialect, there's still a question of "which Min" is the most ancient...

By the way, Min Nan is spoken in all of Singapore, not parts of Singapore...can't imagine what "parts of Singapore" entails, it being such a small piece of land...


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## vince

I thought Min Nan is "banned" in Singapore, that only Mandarin is allowed out of the Chinese languages to be broadcast in the media, and that only old people speak Min Nan.

What do you speak with your friends: Mandarin or Min Nan?

Min Nan will die as long as people consider it to be some subservient dialect of Chinese instead of an independent language just like Spanish and French. Too bad, as Min Nan preserves a lot of characteristics from Middle Chinese.


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## Kwunlam

vince said:


> I thought Min Nan is "banned" in Singapore, that only Mandarin is allowed out of the Chinese languages to be broadcast in the media, and that only old people speak Min Nan.
> 
> What do you speak with your friends: Mandarin or Min Nan?
> 
> Min Nan will die as long as people consider it to be some subservient dialect of Chinese instead of an independent language just like Spanish and French. Too bad, as Min Nan preserves a lot of characteristics from Middle Chinese.


 
I have studied in Singapore for 4 years during my secondary years.  The younger generations can listen to few words or sentences with their grandparents; some even perform better.  But, in general, they no longer master the dialect vividly nor do they possess a rich vocabulary they enable them to communicate effectively, or engage in any academically/scientifically or literarily meaningful activities. 

Minnan may perhaps become a dead language, or a half-dead-half-lively language only used within a very narrow strata of the entire population, namely the older generation.


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## samanthalee

vince said:


> I thought Min Nan is "banned" in Singapore, that only Mandarin is allowed out of the Chinese languages to be broadcast in the media, and that only old people speak Min Nan.


 
Not exactly "banned" since we won't get arrested for speaking in Hokkien  btw, that's the version of "Min Nan" we use here. And it is only banned in free off-air broadcasting. The subscription-based cable tv channels are not affected.



vince said:


> What do you speak with your friends: Mandarin or Min Nan?


 
For some weird reasons, engineering students were starting to communicate in Hokkien in the local universities and we have brought this habit into our workplace.

So I speak Hokkien with my engineering friends and Mandarin with my other friends.



Kwunlam said:


> But, in general, they no longer master the dialect vividly nor do they possess a rich vocabulary they enable them to communicate effectively, or engage in any academically/scientifically or literarily meaningful activities.


 

That is true, the Hokkien we speak is pidgin Hokkien. There are various reasons for this. Firstly, most of our fore-fathers were lowly educated farmers and labourers. They never taught us to recite poetry in Hokkien.  

Secondly, the use of the language was so wide-spread it became a "market" language... It got mixed with the other "market" language, Malay. Most older Chinese know Malay and most older Malays know Hokkien. And the older Indians know both Malay and Hokkien.
They are so mixed up that we code-switch between the 2 without being conscious about it. In fact, we will be hard-pressed to pick out which of the terms we used were borrowed from Malay and which are not.



Kwunlam said:


> Minnan may perhaps become a dead language, or a half-dead-half-lively language only used within a very narrow strata of the entire population, namely the older generation.


 
As long as Taiwanese variety shows remains popular and available on cable tv; and Taiwanese pop singers continue to chun out Minnan songs, Hokkien will not be a dead language in Singapore.


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## Frank06

Hi,


eastlife said:


> My friend and I brought up an arguement, which was quite funny. He thinks Fujianese is the most ancient dialect. Some people believe Fujianese is exactly the same as the official language in Tang dynasty. But it's not proved.



'More ancient' as applied to the comparison of languages doesn't make any sense at all. All languages are equally old or ancient (apart from creoles and conlangs, of course). See here. The only thing that can be compared are the labels, not the languages themselves...

Or do you mean more conservative? But then the question is how you are going to measure that and which 'ancient standard' are you going to use to compare it?

Groetjes,

Frank


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## samanthalee

Frank06 said:


> All languages are equally old or ancient (apart from creoles and conlangs, of course). See here. The only thing that can be compared are the labels, not the languages themselves...


I think what Eastlife meant was that the dialect did not evolve/mutate from its original root as much as the other dialects. For example, if all European languages have their roots in Latin, then the one that most resembles Latin is the "most ancient" European language.


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