A Study Of The Proper Names In The Classic Of Mountains And Seas

The Classic of Mountains and Seas(Shan Hai Jing), a work of the Waning States Period, though of little length-fewer than 31,000 words, consists of as many as 2,142 proper names. We can safely say that the description in this book is centered on proper names. However, except for the few essays on the proper names in this book, no comprehensive and specialized research has been done on them. Therefore, this present thesis aims at a comprehensive study of the proper names and the theories concerned in this regard.This thesis consists of six parts. Chapter One, namely the introduction, is a brief historical overview of the study of the proper names. The author attempts to trace the origin and significance of the problem and to present the target, task, theories, methods etc concerned in this thesis. In Chapter Two, the content and the author of this book are introduced. The author has also put in order the time of the book's being written, and the state of the book's being studied. In Chapter Three, the conceptions of the proper names are discussed. The author has also probed into the problem on how to define a proper name. Chapter Four deals with the principles and methods on how to define the proper names in this book. Based on the principle of "like attracts like", the author categorizes the proper names in thisbook. And all of the proper names in this book fall into the following eighteen categories: the names of deities, states, mountains, waters, valleys, grass, trees, birds, animals, insects, fish, minerals, music and dance, instruments, food, diseases, worship and wind. The nine proper names that cannot be defined are put in another category. Chapter Five is the main body of this thesis, in which the significance of the denomination of the proper names and the methods on how to do research on the significance are explored. The author puts emphasis on fifteen of the proper names. Specifically, the author carries out his research from a perspective of linguistics and he endeavors to sum up the evolvement of the proper names. Meanwhile, he tries to elaborate the significance of the proper names' being named from the standpoint of cultural and historical background. Chapter Six aims at a comprehensive exploration on the principles and laws about the names of places and animals. Then the structures of the proper names in this book are studied. Lastly, the relationship between the names and the entities are studied.This thesis, following the methods of specific research, induction and generalization, attempts to deeply and comprehensively explore the proper names in The Classic of Mountains and Seas. In conclusion, the author endeavors to delineate the overall appearances of the proper names in this book, which is likely to be linguistically useful for further study of this book. The author hopes that his work on this book can open up some possible channels for the study on the terms of the Warring States Period so that more people will join in this study.