CLASSICAL CHINESE

As the English term implies, Classical Chinese (古代汉语) was used in the Chinese classics, such as the writings of pre-Qin philosophers Confucius 孔子, Mencius 孟子, Zhuangzi 庄子and Laozi 老子 from as far back as 3000 years ago. But Classical Chinese is more than an older version of Chinese. As a formal written language, it is also known as literary Chinese (文言文) used throughout imperial China before the 20^th century.

While the characters used in Classical Chinese may look the same as modern Chinese, Classical Chinese is quite a bit different from modern Chinese. The differences can be seen in both grammar and word meaning.

CHANGE OF MEANINGS

The meanings of many modern Chinese words were different in classical Chinese. Take some very common words for example:

Example Words	Sound in Modern Mandarin	Meaning in Modern Chinese	Meaning in Classical Chinese
走	zǒu	‘to walk, leave	‘to run’
木	mù	‘wood’	‘tree’
饮	yǐn	‘related to beverage’	‘to drink’
食	Shí	‘related to food’	‘to eat’
去	qù	‘go to’	‘depart from’
请 Verb	qǐng	‘please Verb’	‘to request for permission to Verb’
是	shì	‘to be’	‘this’
行	xíng	‘OK’	‘to walk’

The differences between the meanings in modern Chinese and classical Chinese are considerable. In the first four, 走 , 木, 饮 and 食, the modern meanings are still related to their Classical counterparts. But the next two, 去 and 请, are contrary to their original meanings. In the last two, 是 and行, he modern meaning of seem unrelated to their Classical counterparts at all.

MONOSYLLABICITY

Classical Chinese was more monosyllabic than modern Chinese, as evidenced by the fact that many morphemes that can only occur in disyllabic compounds used to be able to stand alone as words:

Classical Chinese	Modern Mandarin
食 ‘eat’	食物 ‘foodstuff’, 饮食 ‘eating&drinking’
饮 ‘drink’	饮料 ’beverage’, 饮食‘eating&drinking’
子 ‘son’	儿子 ’son’, 子女 ‘children’
女 ‘daughter’	女儿’daughter’, 子女 ‘children’

NO MEASURE WORDS

Unlike modern Chinese dialects that require measure words in noun phrases expressing quantity, numbers could be used directly with nouns in Classical Chinese. The following example from Confucius’ Analects makes this very clear (idiomatic translation: ‘among a company of three there must be someone who can teach me something’):

三	人	行	必	有	我	师
sān	rén	xíng	bì	yǒu	wǒ	shī
three	person	walk	must	have	my	teacher

OBJECT VERB REVERSAL

Whereas modern Chinese has SVO word order except in the BA construction, in Classical Chinese, pronouns objects in negative and interrogative sentences can be placed before the verbs and after the negation and question word to give rise to SOV word order:

Subject	Negation	Object	Verb
时	不	我	待
shí	bù	wǒ	dài
Time	not	me	wait
人	莫	之	知
rén	mò	zhī	zhī
people	not	it	know

The special behavior of pronouns may not be that unexpected, as it can be seen in English as well. While we can have an object noun either before or after a phrasal verb (a verb particle combination) like ‘to pick a book up, to pick up a book’, we have to put the object pronoun between the verb and the particle (pick it up, *pick up it).

MULTIPLE PARTS OF SPEECH

While the same form can be used for different parts of speech in modern Chinese, such as the use of 发展fāzhǎn as both ‘to develop’ and ‘development’, the use of same words as different parts of speech is much more prevalent in Classical Chinese.

Nouns as verbs: Nouns that cannot be used as verbs in modern Chinese can be used as such in Classical Chinese:

吾	能	为	之	足
wǔ	néng	wèi	zhī	zú
I	can	for	It	foot

‘I can paint a foot for it’.

The noun ‘foot’ is used as the verb ‘to paint foot/feet’.

驴	不	胜	怒	蹄	之
lǘ	bú	shèng	nù	tí	zhī
Donkey	not	stand	angry	hoof	it

‘The donkey was very angry and kicked it.’

The noun ‘hoof’ is used as the verb ‘to kick (with hoof)’.

Nouns as adverbials: In classical Chinese, it is possible to use nouns directly as adverbials, without a preposition, which is required in modern Chinese and English.

豕	人	立	而	啼
shǐ	rén	lì	ér	tí
pig	person	stand	and	cry

Modern Chinese: 猪像人一样站着叫.

Pig like person same stand zhe cry.

English translation: ‘The pig stood like a person and oinked’.

Causative (使动): First of all, some examples of causative in English. In the following table, the transitive verb phrases on the left can all be interpreted as the causative equivalent of those intransitive verb phrases on the right:

Causative transitive	Non-causative intransitive
To anger someone	To cause someone to be angry
To melt something	To cause something to melt
To break something	To cause something to break
A X B	A causes B to X

Now the Chinese examples:

生	死	而	肉	骨
shēng	sǐ	ér	ròu	gǔ
live	dead	and	flesh	bone

‘(someone) causes the dead to live and bones to have flesh’

断	其	喉	尽	其	肉
duàn	qí	hóu	jìn	qí	ròu
break	its	throat	finish	its	flesh

‘(someone) causes its throat to break and its flesh to be finished’

Verbalization of intention/attitude (意动): ‘A noun/adjective B = A consider/treat B as noun/adjective’

不	远	万	里
bù	yuǎn	wàn	lǐ
not	far	10 thousand	li

‘not consider ten thousand li to be far’

鱼	肉	百	姓
yú	ròu	bǎi	xìng
fish	meat	hundred	surname

‘treat common people (hundred surname) as fish and meat (abuse at will)’

君	君	臣	臣	父	父	子	子
jūn	jūn	chén	chén	fù	fù	zǐ	zǐ
king	king	subject	subject	father	father	son	son

‘treat king as king, subject as subject, father as father, son as son’

孟	尝	君	客	我
mèng	cháng	jūn	kè	wǒ
Mèng	cháng	lord	guest	me

‘Lord Mengchang treated me as a guest’.

Object Marker所: In Classical Chinese there was a word 所 standing for an omitted object of a verb. 所 Verb means ‘Verb 的东西 (the thing that is verb-ed), which is equivalent to a kind of relative clause marker (RM) in English ‘what/that is Verb-ed’. Here are two often-heard phrases:

所	见	所	闻
suǒ	jiàn	suǒ	wén
RM	see	RM	hear

‘what is seen and heard’

所	用	非	所	学
suǒ	yòng	fēi