Initial Reconstruction Of Ancient 'Qilu' Dialect

Shangdong Province is situated to the east of Mountain Taihang, along the lower reaches of the Yellow River, between 114°47'and 122°43'E,34°23' and 38°24'N. Shangdong Province is also called'the land of Qilu', which came from the name of the'Qi'state and the 'Lu' state during the Pre-Qin era. Originally the terms referred to the names of the states, then they became the title of Shandong area. The initials in Shandong dialect display a great variety and contain many special values. Combining the results from field work and dialect annals, the dissertation compares the phonological systems of Rongcheng, Mouping, Jimo, Juxian, Lijin, Boshan, Xintai, Pingyi, Tancheng, Jinxiang, and Dongming. In the process of reconstruction, we add dialectal materials from Zhucheng, Wulian, Rizhao, Jinan, Weihai, Yantai, and Yishui. Based on modern dialect materials, the dissertation reconstructs the proto initial system of the ancient'Qilu'dialect with the Comparative Method and the Internal Reconstruction. Relying on the system of Guangyun, this dissertation also details the diachronic development of the ancient 'Qilu'dialect and identifies strata in the modern dialects. We compares the proto initial system of the ancient'Qilu'dialect with the ancient Chinese initial systems at different time periods summerized up by Wang Li.This dissertation consists of five chapters. The main ideas are summarized as follows:Chapter 1 mainly introduces the geographic location, population, historical changes and administrative division of Shandong Province. It provides an overview of previous researches on this topic, as well as an introduction of the method employed in this research,including the concepts, the applications to different languages, and evaluations of the Comparative Method and the Internal Reconstruction.Chapter 2 sums up the changes and diversifications of the finals and tones from ancient Shandong dialect to its modern off-springs. Because initials closely interact with finals and tones, the dissertation up tables to illustrate the changes of finals and tones in different Shandong sub-dialects before we reconstruct the proto initial system.Chapter 3 is devoted to the proto initial reconstruction of the ancient'Qilu' dialect. We reconstruct ancient initials including Jian, Xi, Qun, Yi, Ying, Yu, Xiao, Xia, Zhi, Che, Cheng, Zhuang, Chu, Chong, Zhang, Chuan, Shu, Chan, Ri, Duan, Tou, Ding, Ni, Lai, Dang, Pang, Bing, Ming, Fei, Fu, Feng, and Wei. Each initial group is reconstructed in three steps. The first step is to sum up the changes from the common ancient form to the current forms in eleven Shandong sub-dialects and list all exceptions. The second step is to draw a table that includes representative examples of each initial. Based on results of the first two steps, the third step is to formulate rules of change and explain mechanism of change. To deal with the data for which we cannot find complementary distribution, we analyze the issues from the perspective of articulation, parallel development and system balance. After that the reconstructed results are checked using information from historical documents and language typology. Ancient voiced initials Oun, Xia, Cheng, Chong, Chuan, Chan, Ding, Bing are reconstructed as unaspirated voiced initials, according to the fact that in modern Shandong sub-dialects these initials co-occur with special tones and they are pronounced as unaspirated in the even tone category. Ancient initials Zhi, Zhuang, Zhang can be reconstructed with two values, but for the sake of regularity, we speculate that these two sets are allophones of the same phoneme. The 'er-suffixation,'is used as an argument in the reconstruction of ancient initials Ri and Jing, yielding special results that reflect the characteristics of the ancient'Qilu'dialect. The ancient initials Ying,Yi,Wei, Shen,Feng,Fu and Zhi,Jing,Jian have merged now, which shows one modern form may have more than one source proto-forms. Chapter 3 also discusses historical development and the strata that reflect different historical stages along with reconstruction.Chapter 4 compares the proto initial system of the ancient'Qilu'dialect with the ancient Chinese initial systems at different time periods summarized up by Wang Li. We offer the explanations for the formation of the special sounds in the ancient 'Qilu'dialect. According to the comparative results, we conclude that each dialect has its own ancient phonological system from which it developed into the current shape. Meanwhile we try to specify the time of the proto initial system of the ancient 'Qilu'dialect.Chapter 5 summarizes the ideas of the dissertation, highlights some original contributions and points out issues to be further studied in future researches.