The earliest Chinese words for ‘the Chinese’: The phonology, meaning, and origin of the epithet ḥaRya ~ ārya in East Asia ChRISTOPhER I. BECKWITh Abstract The first signs of Chinese ethnic self-consciousness coincide with the beginnings of political philosophy in the Warring States period. The peoples who spoke Old Chinese adopted an unprecedented appellation for themselves and also began referring to their many states collectively as if they were, or should be, a unified country with a unified imperial ancestry, the Hsia 夏 (Old Chinese *Ḥarya). Most strikingly, this new self appellation, which eventually became the autonym for ‘Chinese’, is a widespread epithet of Central Eurasian ruling peoples as far west as Persia and continued to be used into the Early Middle Ages. Analysis of the data shows that in the Warring States period the Chinese acquired this new term and idea from the Central Eurasian population of the state of Chao.1 Résumé Les premiers signes chinois d’une prise de conscience ethnique coïncident avec le début de la philosophie politique dans la période des Royaumes combattants. Les peuples locuteurs du Chinois archaïque adoptaient une appellation sans précédent, Hia 夏 (Chin. arch. *Ḥarya), faisant ainsi allusion aux États collectivement, comme s’ils constituaient une unité, partageant le même patrimoine ancestral et impérial. Cette nouvelle appellation qui devenait l’autonyme pour « Chinois » fut utilisée comme qualificatif très répandu par des peuples dominants, de l’Eurasie centrale vers l’ouest jusqu’à la Perse, encore dans le haut Moyen Âge. L’analyse des données révèle que dans la période des Royaumes combattants, les Chinois ont acquis cette nouvelle appellation et son idée directrice des peuples Centre-Eurasie de l’État de Tchao. 1 HSIA 夏~ HUA 華 ‘ThE ChINESE’: (ca. 390 to ca. 312 BC),2 and other contemporaneous TEXTS AND TRADITIONAL INTERNAL RECONSTRUCTION Warring States period texts contain the earliest datable usages of the Classical Chinese words used as generic The origins of Chinese ‘ethnic’ or ‘national’ con- terms for the dominant inhabitants of the early Chinese sciousness, whether or not connected to political unifica- cultural area, which comprised many states large and tion, have long been mysterious. The Tso chuan 左傳 small during the period when the texts were composed. The words do not occur in the sense ‘(the) Chinese’ in any earlier texts,3 including the Ch’un ch’iu 春秋, the 1 I am indebted to the Japan Foundation for supporting part of the genuine early chronicle on the basis of which the Tso research and writing of this paper with a Short Term Fellowship in Tokyo (summer, 2013). I would like to thank E. Bruce Brooks, Yanxiao chuan was later written. He, Gisaburo N. Kiyose, Victor Mair, and Andrew E. Shimunek for The usual generic term is Hsia 夏 MSC (Modern corrections and suggestions for improvements, and Wolfgang Behr for Standard Chinese) xià, which as a common noun in Clas- sending me his article on Hsia 夏 (Behr 2007). I also thank the Acad- sical and modern Chinese means, literally, ‘summer’.4 It emy of Korean Studies (Seoul) for inviting me to present an earlier version of this paper in Seoul in 2013. I am of course responsible for any errors. ABBREVIATIONS: Bax. (Baxter 1992); C: any consonant; 2 Dating by E. Bruce Brooks and Taeko Brooks <www.umass.edu/ CY: Ch’ieh yün of Wang Jen-hsü (Lung 1968); dial.: dialect; HSR: wsp/chronology/overview.html #ws>. Historic Sinological Reconstruction (the traditional system based on 3 Mair (2013). medieval rhyme tables); JDB (Omodaka et al. 1967); LMC: Late Mid- 4 Karlgren (1957: 28). According to Mair (2013: 5, 7-8), Hsia 夏 dle Chinese; Pul. (Pulleyblank 1991); MSC: Modern Standard Chinese is first attested in the Bronze Inscriptions and early Classical texts in in pinyin spelling; Sch. (Schuessler 1987); Sta. (Starostin 1989); Tak. the meaning “large, grand; variegated”, and is later written with an (Takata 1988); V: any vowel. For forms reconstructed (by anyone) additional “sun” (日) radical to express the meaning “summer”. It from Chinese characters via the traditional method, tone marks are con- occurs in its usual form, meaning ‘summer’, in the earliest authentic verted to subscript numerals and the mark (✩) is added. Internal deri- historical work from the Spring and Autumn–Warring States period, the vation is marked by < (‘from’); → and ← mark direction of borrowing. Ch’un ch’iu ‘Spring and Autumn Annals’. Journal Asiatique 304.2 (2016): 231-248 doi: 10.2143/JA.304.2.3186091 99263_JAS_2016-2_06_Beckwith.indd 231 25/01/17 12:38 232 Christopher I. Beckwith is also the name of the legendary first dynasty of Chinese “The Master said, “The rude tribes of the east and north history, traditionally dated from the end of the third mil- have their princes, and are not like the States of our great lennium to the middle of the second millennium BC.5 In land which are without them.” However, since all of the the Tso chuan, Hsia 夏 without the explicit collective 諸夏 ‘Chinese (peoples, states)’ had princes, the point plural marker chu 諸 MSC zhū sometimes means ‘Hsia was surely that they were not unified under one prince. Dynasty’ or things or people related to it, so it is not This is supported by another famous early example, from always generic. However, as 諸夏, in the collective plu- the Tso chuan, where the Chinese are compared unfa- ral, it always means ‘the Chinese (peoples, states)’,6 as it vorably to all foreign peoples: usually does in the unmarked form 夏 as well. The text 吾聞之，天子失官，學在四夷。 once explicitly contrasts the 諸夏 ‘the Hsia (peoples or states)’7 with the foreign peoples of the north and west.8 I have heard that if a Son of Heaven has lost (the way of In one instance it is used in contrast to the semi-Sinified good) governance, (he should) study it among the four I.11 southern states, such as Ch’u 楚 and Yüeh 越.9 The 夷 explicitly plural 諸夏 occurs also in the Lun yü 論語 Here the “four I” refers to the foreign peoples (I ‘Analects’, but in a late interpolation in which Confucius MSC yí) in the four quarters outside Chinese territory. 夏 says: Hsia ‘Chinese’ also occurs in other Warring States texts. The more specific expression 諸夏之國 ‘the states 夷狄之有君，不如諸夏之亡也。 of the Chinese (peoples)’ occurs twice in the Hsün tzu 荀子 (early to mid-3rd century BC),12 in which it is used The Ti 狄 and I 夷, who have a lord, are unlike the Chi- nese (諸夏), who do not have one.10 to explicitly distinguish the assemblage of Chinese states from the states of the foreign peoples of the four quarters The passage is ambiguous (it is either a positive or a outside Chinese territory. negative comparison), and the word 君 ‘lord, ruler, A synonymous term that occurs less frequently and in prince’ can be understood as either singular or plural. A far fewer texts, but is unambiguous, is Hua 華 MSC huá, frequent reading is that although the foreigners do have which as a common noun normally means, literally, a lord (ruler) or lords, they are not as good as the Chi- ‘flower’.13 Unlike most other texts, in which Hua 華 nese, who are without a lord or lords. Legge translates it: rarely occurs, in the 左傳 Tso chuan it occurs about as frequently as Hsia 夏, both as an explicit collective plural 5 Keightley (1999: 248) ends his discussion of the date of the (諸華 MSC zhū huá ‘the Chinese [peoples, states]’)14 or establishment of the subsequent fully historical dynasty, Shang, by not- alone,15 usually for the specific purpose of distinguishing ing that based on the dating of “astronomical events it is possible to conclude that the first year of Cheng Tang would have been 1554.” Mair (2013: 30), summarizing the present state of knowledge, says, 11 Tso chuan, Chao-kung 17. Texts and Legge from the Chinese “we cannot find any evidence that the word Xià in any of its various Text Project <ctext.org/>.) On the erroneous ancient variant of this senses, much less as the name of a dynasty or state, existed during the passage see Beckwith (2009: 74-75 n. 64). Shāng period. I have not even been able to ascertain that the word Xià 12 Hsün tzu 18.5; 18.14. occurs in the Western Zhōu B[ronze ]I[nscription]s in any of its later 13 Loewe (1999: 994) translates 諸華 (zhū Huá) as “the many senses. In any event, there is no evidence that it was employed during states blessed with elegance”. Mair (2013: 27) supports similar etymo- the Western Zhōu as the name of a dynasty that was supposed to have logical proposals, and concludes, “Xià was very much in evidence preceded the Shāng. Xià comes to be used as the name of an ancient during the Warring States period as a ubiquitous epithet (viz., ‘grand’) dynasty only in Warring States texts, a good thousand years after the for the peoples and cultures of the … Central Plains” (Mair 2013: 31). alleged Xià Dynasty”. Nevertheless, regardless of the possible etymological origins and mean- 6 It so occurs six times in the Tso chuan according to Serguei ings of the graphs as Chinese common nouns—hua 華 and hsia 夏, Zinine’s database <www.umass.edu/ctexts/>. usually ‘flower’ and ‘summer’ respectively by Classical Chinese 7 Tso chuan V/21.5 (Legge 1893/1985: 179, 180), IX/13.3 (Legge times—in the proper name usage discussed here they are unquestion- 1893/1985: 456, 458b), IV/1.1-2 (Legge 1893/1985: 123-124).