The Jinxiang dialect ( zh, s=金鄉話, p=Jīnxiānghuà) is a Taihu Wu dialect, or a Northern Wu dialect, spoken in the county of Cangnan of the prefecture-level city

Wenzhou Wenzhou; Chinese postal romanization, historically known as Wenchow is a prefecture-level city in China's Zhejiang province. Wenzhou is located at the extreme southeast of Zhejiang, bordering Lishui, Zhejiang, Lishui to the west, Taizhou, Zheji ...

. It is considered to be a Taihu Wu linguistic exclave within the mostly

Min Nan Southern Min (), Minnan ( Mandarin pronunciation: ) or Banlam (), is a group of linguistically similar and historically related Chinese languages that form a branch of Min Chinese spoken in Fujian (especially the Minnan region), most of Taiwan ...

-speaking part of Southern Zhejiang. The Modern Jinxiang dialect is descended from the speech of soldiers from Northern Zhejiang who settled during the

Ming dynasty The Ming dynasty, officially the Great Ming, was an Dynasties of China, imperial dynasty of China that ruled from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol Empire, Mongol-led Yuan dynasty. The Ming was the last imperial dynasty of ...

due to

Wokou ''Wokou'' ( zh, c=, p=Wōkòu; ; Hepburn romanization, Hepburn: ; ; literal Chinese translation: "dwarf bandits"), which translates to "Japanese pirates", were pirates who raided the coastlines of China and Korea from the 13th century to the 17 ...

pirate raids, during the reign of the

Jiajing Emperor The Jiajing Emperor (16September 150723January 1567), also known by his temple name as the Emperor Shizong of Ming, personal name Zhu Houcong, art name, art names Yaozhai, Leixuan, and Tianchi Diaosou, was the 12th List of emperors of the Ming ...

. These soldiers were sent to Jinxiang to protect the town from raids by the Wokou. The majority of Jinxiang natives today are descended from those soldiers who served under

Qi Jiguang Qi Jiguang (, November 12, 1528 – January 17, 1588), courtesy name Yuanjing, art names Nantang and Mengzhu, posthumous name Wuyi, was a Chinese military general and writer of the Ming dynasty. He is best known for leading the defense on th ...

. Isolated from the other Taihu Wu-speaking regions, surrounded by

-speaking areas, the Jinxiang dialect has some degree of influence from Zhenan Min. It has also some influence from Mandarin Chinese.

References

{{st-lang-stub Wu Chinese