Zhengzhang Shangfang (; ; 9 August 1933 – 19 May 2018) was a Chinese linguist, known for his reconstruction of Old Chinese. Zhengzhang was born as Zheng Xiangfang ( ; ) in

Yongjia County Yongjia County (; Wenzhou dialect: yon2ko1/ yu3 ''ion ko'') is a county in Wenzhou in the southeast of Zhejiang province, People's Republic of China, located north of the city proper of Wenzhou city, which administers the county. The Nanxi River ...

, on the outskirts of

Wenzhou Wenzhou (pronounced ; Wenzhounese: Yuziou �y33–11 tɕiɤu33–32 ), Chinese postal romanization, historically known as Wenchow is a prefecture-level city in southeastern Zhejiang province of China, province in the China, People's Republic ...

. As and have the same pronunciation in the

Wenzhou dialect Wenzhounese (), also known as Oujiang (), Tong Au () or Au Nyü (), is the language spoken in Wenzhou, the southern prefecture of Zhejiang, China. Nicknamed the "Devil's Language" () for its complexity and difficulty, it is the most divergent div ...

, his personal name became Shangfang ( ). While he was in high school, his parents changed his family name to Zhengzhang ( ), a combination of the parents' surnames ( Zhèng and Zhāng). At this time, he became interested in historical phonology and studied the works of

Yuen Ren Chao Yuen Ren Chao (; 3 November 1892 – 25 February 1982), also known as Zhao Yuanren, was a Chinese-American linguist, educator, scholar, poet, and composer, who contributed to the modern study of Chinese phonology and grammar. Chao was born a ...

, Wang Li and others at Wenzhou's library. In 1954, unable to enter university to study linguistics, he began geological work in the Beijing area. In his spare time, he continued to develop his own ideas on

Old Chinese phonology Scholars have attempted to reconstruct the phonology of Old Chinese from documentary evidence. Although the writing system does not describe sounds directly, shared phonetic components of the most ancient Chinese characters are believed to link ...

, particularly the finals and vowel system. In the 1960s and 1970s, he undertook dialect survey work in Wenzhou for

Lü Shuxiang Lü Shuxiang (, 1904–1998) was a Chinese linguist, lexicographer and educator, and founder of Modern Chinese linguistic studies. Overview Lü Shuxiang was born in Danyang, Jiangsu Province. He studied Foreign Languages and Literature in the ...

until he was sent to work in a factory during the

Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated go ...

. During a period when the factory was closed due to a factional battle in the

Chinese Communist Party The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Ci ...

, he began exchanging ideas with Pan Wuyun and Jin Shengrong, and refined his

Old Chinese Old Chinese, also called Archaic Chinese in older works, is the oldest attested stage of Chinese, and the ancestor of all modern varieties of Chinese. The earliest examples of Chinese are divinatory inscriptions on oracle bones from around 12 ...

system to a six-vowel system. Essentially the same system was independently developed by William Baxter (building on a proposal by Nicholas Bodman) and by

Sergei Starostin Sergei Anatolyevich Starostin (russian: Серге́й Анато́льевич Ста́ростин; March 24, 1953 – September 30, 2005) was a Russian historical linguist and philologist, perhaps best known for his reconstructions of hypothet ...

. In 1980, he joined the

Chinese Academy of Social Sciences The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) is a Chinese research institute and think tank. The institution is the premier comprehensive national academic research organization in the People's Republic of China for the study in the fields of ...

Publications

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References

Works cited

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Zhengzhang, Shangfang 1933 births 2018 deaths Linguists from China Chinese phonologists Educators from Wenzhou Writers from Wenzhou Shanghai Normal University faculty Scientists from Wenzhou 20th-century linguists 21st-century linguists Linguists of Chinese