4 ms·
FWIW: my understanding is that there's a dialect issue at work too. The folks providing the pronunciation to a transliterator that became "Peking" said the nam
by ajross 4y ago
FWIW: my understanding is that there's a dialect issue at work too. The folks providing the pronunciation to a transliterator that became "Peking" said the name of the city somewhat differently than the people living in Beijing today do.
- mc32 4y agoYeah, Peking is much closer to the Cantonese pronunciation of the city, however, I think the guys who came up with the romanization did live in the north capital city. On the other hand Wade-Giles is more prevalent in Singapore, HK and Taiwan, for example --though in some instances they are starting to follow the pinyin transliteration.
- glxxyz 4y agoWade-Giles is more prevalent in places that kept Traditional characters, because the mainland switched to Simplified and pinyin in the 1950s.
- thaumasiotes 4y agoetymonline says "Peking" comes from Hong Kong without much argument devoted to the question. Wiktionary claims, much more convincingly, that it comes from the Mandarin pronunciation of 450 years ago, before palatalization took place. > Abraham Ortelius used C. Paquin for his 1572 Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, the first modern atlas; Italian Jesuit Martino Martini used Peking in his 1654 Latin De Bello Tartarico Historia and 1655 Novus Atlas Sinensis, which were quickly translated into English ( https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Peking#Etymology https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Peking#Etymology )
- glxxyz 4y agoNot really, under the old Wade-Giles romanization system the city was transliterated as 'Peking'. Under the newer (~65 year old) pinyin system it's transliterated as 'Beijing'. The pronunciation in Mandarin never changed, just the way that sounds which don't have any exact equivalent in our alphabet are represented. Chang used to be a very common Chinese surname, but Zhang is now. It's the same name.
- mc32 4y agoYep, this is the reason. The same reason they use 'q', 'c' and 'x' etc., they don't correspond to English, or Italian pronunciation of those letters. They are "pronunciation keys" and Wade-Giles was the same. Just represented differently.
- thaumasiotes 4y ago> under the old Wade-Giles romanization system the city was transliterated as 'Peking' Not even close. Under the old Wade-Giles system the name of the city is transliterated as 'pei-ching'. That is because, as you note, the pronunciation in Mandarin didn't change. You seem to be imagining a sound that might be interpreted as a K or, alternatively, might be interpreted as a J, but there is no such sound.
- glxxyz 4y agoWell, at least close-er, yes the 'k' is older than Wade Giles, the changes in spelling are still just changes in romanizations systems.
- thaumasiotes 4y agoNo, that's not correct. The 'k' in Peking is there because Peking is not a transcription from Mandarin. The change was in what language to use for the name of the city, not in what romanization system to use.
- glxxyz 4y agoI didn't say the k was a romanization, I said it was older.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- glxxyz 4y ago> You seem to be imagining a sound that might be interpreted as a K or, alternatively, might be interpreted as a J No, not at all