Post by clydewin98 on Jul 25, 2010 23:36:51 GMT -5
Evidence of Chinese writing first appears around 2000 B.C. as pottery marks. The shell-and-bone characters represented writing they were not pictures. The Shang symbols compare favorably with ancient Manding symbols. Although their are different contemporary pronunciations for these symbols they have the same meaning and shape. This suggest a genetic relationship between these scripts because we know that the present pronunciation of the Chinese symbols probably has little relationship to the ancient pronunciation of Chinese spoken in Xia and Shang times when these characters were first used. This cognation of scripts supports the proposed Dravidian and Manding migration and settlement of ancient China during Xia times.
The identification of the first hero of China, Hu Nak Kunte as a member of the Kunte clan of the Manding speakers of Africa is supported by the close relationship between the Manding languages and Chinese. Even though we do not know the ancient pronunciation of many Chinese signs many Chinese and Manding words share analogy and suggest a Manding substratum for Chinese.
Chinese and Manding share many typological features. These features include reduplication for emphasis and the use of suffixes to form words.
In Chinese the -zi suffix, is joined to many nouns e.g., 0 qizi # 'wife'; 0 tizi # 'ladder'; and 0 jinzi # 'gold'. This -zi, suffix corresponds to the Manding use of si 'that, that one,those' e.g., kye si 'that man'.
The suffix -tou is used to form place words e.g., 0 litou # 'inside' and 0 qiantou # 'front'. In Manding the word for place was -ta.
The Chinese -r suffix is used to form nouns e.g., 0 hua # 'to paint' and 0 huar # 'picture'. This corresponds to the Manding suffix -ra which transforms verbs into nouns, e.g., 0 kyi # 'to send' and 0 kyira # 'messenger'.
There is also some analogy between Chinese and Manding pronouns:
Language I You he,she
Chinese wo ni ta
Manding ne ni, i a
These languages also share the interogative pronouns:
Chinese English Manding
0 ho # who,which,what 0 o #
In addition to cognate writing and grammatical features the Chinese and Manding share many lexical items. Below we compare Chinese and Manding terms. The Chinese terms are written in the Pinyin (phonetic alphabet) which is popular in China today.
There are numerous examples of phonetic correspondence between Chinese and Manding.
d=/=t
Chinese English Manding
di bend down ti 'negation suffix
da to cut down,destroy te 'negative particle'
dai to alter ta 'to put in'
du rot toli
da hill, hillock te-mbo
di Supreme Ruler tigi
d=/=d
da great,noble dya, da
di child di
da big dya,di 'several'
b=/=b
bu 'negative' bu 'to be in decrease
bo to break bo, bu 'to give a blow
ban great ba
b=/=p
bi to press,make impression pe
bai white, clean po
d=/=b
do cut bo, bu
h=/=o
ho 'everywhere' o 'void'
ho who,which,where o
f=/=f
fa 'kill' fe 'to be void'
s=/=s
shan 'mountain sande 'the sky region near water'
sa loose sa 'to die'
su 'to pound' --- su 'to mix'
su to suck susu
k=/=k
kan stem ka, kala
ku to cut open,rip up kulo 'to soften'
y=/=y
yu abundant,excessive yo 'perfect'
w=/=w
wa hollow wo
n=/=m
nu women musu
mu eye nya
ma mother na
o=/=o
do cut bo
bo 'break' ---- bo 'to five a blow'
rou flesh soro
a=/=a
da big dya
da great da
sa 'to loose' --- sa 'to die'
ban great ba
ma mother ma
o=/=u
so to grind su
yu 'abundant' --- yo 'perfect'
du rot toli
do cut bu
i=/=i
niu cow ni
xin 'heart' --- si 'breast'
di child di
iu give di
a=/=e
da 'to destroy' te 'negative particle'
tien cultivated field de-n
u=/=u
bu 'negative' bu 'to be decreased'
nu woman musu
du earth dugu
lu house lu
Above we have compared forty-six cognate Chinese and Manding terms. These terms can be divided into three sets of cognate items, (1) words in both languages with equivalent meanings with full correspondence, (2) words with consonants showing assimilation and (3) words with equivalent meanings but lacking similar phonetic values. Using this criteria we find that the cognate rate for corresponding Chinese and Manding terms are the following percentages 54% of the terms show full correspondence; 30 % show cognate terms with alternating consonants e.g., d=/=t, p=/=b , and etc.; and 15 percent of these terms are unrelated.
The analogy between the Manding and Chinese languages suggest that Manding is a substratum of Chinese. This also supports the view that some early rulers of China came from the Kunte clan and were Manding speakers.