The Chinese Rhyme Tables: A New Probe Into the Nature of Middle Chinese Phonology

By studying the emergence, development, structure, and pattern, the two-volume set seeks to reconstruct the ancient rhyme Chinese tables based on extant materials and findings.

A rhyme table is a tabulated tool constituted by phonological properties, which helps indicate the pronunciation of sinograms or Chinese characters, marking an accurate and systematic account of the Chinese phonological system. The first volume discusses its formation and evolution and analyzes the structure and arrangement patterns of rhyme tables in detail. The author gives insights into principles for some irregular cases (menfa rules) and the nature of “division” (deng), a method of classifying and differentiating speech sounds vital to the reconstruction of Middle Chinese. The second volume first explores the relationship and identifies the prototype of the extant rhyme tables and then presents the reconstructed rhyme tables with detailed annotations and add-on indexes.

The book will appeal to scholars and students studying Sinology, Chinese linguistics, and especially Chinese phonology.

Pan Wenguo is a tenured professor and doctoral supervisor at East China Normal University and the honorary president of the Chinese Association for Comparative Studies between English and Chinese. He is a renowned linguist and has a significant impact on fields of Chinese linguistics, including sinogram ontology, word formation, and rhyme divisions, and also Chinese-English comparative studies, translation theory and practice, and linguistic philosophy.