Correspondence Relationship Between Chinese Initials And Japanese Consonants

Japanese Kanji were brought to Japan from China. Along with their writing, the then Chinese pronunciation was also introduced to Japan and has been fixed in the Japanese pronunciation as the sound of Japanese Kanji. For Japanese Kanji, they have many pronunciations, among which Goon and Kanon are the most major two. Goon and Kanon pronunciations were brought to Japan during600AD-1000AD, a period of mid-ancient Chinese pronunciation filled with the most detailed phonological information. This paper takes Japanese Consonants as its object to focus on the correspondence relationship between them and Chinese Initials "d, t, n,1".The author firstly applied Xue Yan Han He Dictionary, Modern Common Japanese Kanji-Chinese Characters Comparison Dictionary and Handbook of Ancient Phonology and Modern Phonology Comparison to classify the modern pronunciations of Japanese Goon and Kanon and the mid-ancient Chinese pronunciations, and sorted them out in tables. After that, the author compared the Goon and Kanon pronunciations of Japanese Kanji with mid-ancient Chinese pronunciation to study their correlations. The full text is composed of the "Prologue", the five body chapters and the "Finale"."Note","References","Appendix" and "Acknowledgement" are also attached here at the end of this paper.Prologue discusses the relationship of Chinese pronunciation and Japanese Kanji pronunciation, introduces those previous literatures and issues focused on this field, sorts out the correspondence relationship between Japanese Kanji pronunciation and mid-ancient Chinese pronunciation, and illustrates the study scope, objectives and methods of this paper.Chapter one is "Introduction to Chinese Initials and Japanese, Finals and Tones". It inspects, on the basis of divisions of Chinese and Japanese language history, the period in which Chinese pronunciation was brought to Japan. It makes comparisons on the classification and features of Chinese initials and Japanese consonants, and it explores the correspondence relationship between Chinese pronunciation and Japanese Kanji pronunciation. Chapter two is "The Correspondence Relationship of Chinese Initial d with Japanese Consonants". Chinese initial d belongs to duanmu and dingmu in mid-ancient Chinese pronunciation. This chapter makes, respectively and in accordance with the classification of mid-ancient Chinese initials, finals and tones and phoneme groups, Japanese-Chinese comparison tables of Japanese Kanji and Chinese characters that belong to both duanmu and dingmu. Based on the above said comparison tables, this chapter inspects the phonetic features of Japanese Kanji and Chinese characters, their correspondence relationship and discusses the correspondence between voiceless sounds and voiced sounds in mid-ancient Chinese pronunciation and Goon and Kanon pronunciations in Japanese Kanji.Chapter three is "The Correspondence Relationship of Chinese Initial t with Japanese Consonants". This chapter is based on the pronunciation of Chinese initial t in characters and, by referring to the Goon and Kanon pronunciations of Japanese Kanji, makes comparisons on the pronunciations of Japanese Kanji and Chinese characters. Modern Chinese initial t belongs to toumu and dingmu in mid-ancient Chinese pronunciation. In this chapter, the author sorts out comparison tables between Japanese Kanji and Chinese characters, respectively, according to doumu and dingmu, explains the correspondence relationship of Japanese consonants with Chinese initials, and discusses the representation of mid-ancient Chinese aspirated consonants and un-aspirated consonants in Japanese pronunciation.Chapter four is "The Correspondence Relationship of Chinese Initial n with Japanese Consonants". This chapter focuses on Chinese characters and Japanese Kanji whose pronunciation involves an initial n and, in accordance with the features, changes and development of Japanese consonants and Chinese initial n, etc., sorts out comparison tables, makes analyses on the Japanese-Chinese comparison table of each phoneme group to specify their correspondence relationship and makes clear the correspondence relationship between Japanese voiced sounds and Chinese nasals.Chapter five is "The Correspondence Relationship of Chinese Initial1with Japanese Consonants". In this chapter, this paper analyzes the features, changes and development of Chinese initial1and, by taking the actual pronunciation of Goon and Kanon of Japanese Kanji as its specific study object, makes corresponding comparisons between the pronunciations of Japanese Kanji and Chinese characters, and investigates the correspondence relationship between Japanese Consonants and Chinese initial1.The finale of this paper summarizes the correspondence relationship between Chinese initials and Japanese Consonants, tries to explore the influences of mid-ancient pronunciation of Chinese characters on Japanese Goon and Kanon pronunciations and puts forward the idea of making further in-depth studies on the related subjects in this field.