ting pang-hsin

THE TAN- CHOU DIALECT OF

J. INTRODUCTION The linguistic situation of Hainan island has been little studied, The languages best known to us are the dialect of Chinese and Li of Kadai. In 1929, Professor Fang Kuei Li made an investigation on the Ch'iung-shan ( £^ il\ ) and Le-hui ( ^ /^ ) dialects of Hainan and discovered that two inspiratory consonants or clicks, b and d, existed in these dialects. He suggested that these inspiratory consonants were not directly derived from Ancient Chinese, but influenced by non-Chinese due to ethnic mixture. (1) Almost thirty years after Li's investigation, Po-hui Chan (1957, 1958, 1959), Chia-chiau Huang (1957), Yu-kang Liang (1958) and Mantaro Hashimoto (1959, 1960a, 1960b, 1961) published their studies on the Southern Min dialects and the so-called Soldier Language in Hainan. During a two-year investigation into the society of in Taiwan, with the assistance of Dah-an Ho, Hsiu-fang Yang, and Hsien-pao Chang, we have studies the following languages and -dialects : Le-hui ( ^ê % ), Hai-k'ou ( ^ ч Ю ), Chfeng-mai ( >^i )» Wan-ning ( % Щ- ) » Hakka, Lin-kao ( ^ ^ ), and Tan-chou ( ^Д Щ ). The

(^) Paper presented at the 12th International Conference on Sino-Tibetan Languages and Linguistics, 19-21 October 1979, Paris. (1) Cf. Monthly Bulletin of Academia Sinica3 Vol. I, № 7, pp. 72-73, 1930.

Cah. de Ling. Asie Orientale № 8 Octobre 1980, pp. 5-27 TING Pang-hsin

first four are sub-dialects of the Southern Min dialect. Hakka in Hainan is fairly close to the standard Hakka of Mei-hsien (;j% Jfj^ ). The Lin-kao dialect, also called the Ong , was investigated by François M. Savina, whose studies were completed by André F . Haudricourt (1965). They (Haudricourt 1965 : 6, 10) relegated the Ong Be language to Thai after they discovered the close relationship between the two languages. Hashimoto (1976 : 66) claims that according to his field investigation the Lin-kao dialect is an extremely Sinicized type of Li language. But he does not give further comments on Haudricourt1 s finding. My own Lin-kao data confirm the statement made by Savina and Haudricourt. The Lin-kao dialect, or Ong Be language, probably has genetic relation with the Kam-. For instance :

Lin-kao Li-Ngam Mak T'en Siam. Lung- Po-ai Li^ ' chow 1. to go рог 35 раг 11 paapaai 24 paai 13 pai 33 раг 33 pai 24 hei . 2. low dom 33 dam 35 dam 35 zam 44 tam 22 tarn 55 tarn 22 thorn 3, liver dop 33 tap 35 tap 35 tap 35 tap 22 tap 55 tap 55 4. seed Von 55 wan 11 van 13 wan 35 fan 31 fan 24 phen 5. fire VQÍ 55 wi 11 vei 13 wii 35 fai 33 fai 31 fii 55 pei 6. leg va 55 qa 11 kaa 24 paa 35 khaa 24 khaa 33 kaa 24 per) 7. horn vau 55 qau 11 kaakaau 24 paau 35 khau 24 kau 24 hau (1) The Lin-kao э corresponds to the Kam-Thai a (Proto Tai *э) in nos. 1, 2 and 3. At the same time, there is an a of Lin-kao corresponding to the Kam-Tai a (Proto Tai *a) in the following examples : 8. eye da 35 da \\ daa \Ъ Idaa 13 taa 33 baa 33 taa 24 sa 9. to die dai 35 tai 11 tai 24 tai 13 taai haai taai 24 (2) The Lin-kao V corresponds to the Kam-Sui w and v » and to the Tai (Proto Tai *V~), as in nos. 4 and 5. (3) There is another V in the Lin-kao dialect ; it corresponds to q, kf p, and kh in the Kam-Tai languages. It is peculiar to set up this kind of correspondance, nevertheless the relationship cannot be denied. I am of the opinion that Haudricourt1 s suggestion (1965 : 138) to reconstruct an ancient labiovelar initial for these forms is acceptable. Although these observations are somewhat superficial, it seems valid to consider the forms cited above as cognate words. More study has to be done before we arrive at any firm conclusion. The Tan-chou dialect has not been studied before. Hashimoto (1960 : 108, 1976 : 66) presumes this is a Mandarin dialect ; I would rather consider it as a dialect of the Southern style. This paper mainly deals with the phonology of the Tan-chou dialect and related problems.

(2) The materials of Li-Ngam, Mak, Tfen, Siamese, Lung-chow, and Po-ai are quoted from Li 1965. (3) Li forms are cited from Savina 1931.