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#ielts #toefl #gre #english_vocabulary #english
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Word of the Day
Word of the Day: ideologue
This word has appeared in 32 articles on NYTimes.com in the past year. Can you use it in a sentence?
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Phrasal Verb of the Day | Vocabulary | EnglishClub
follow through
to continue something to the next stage, or to complete something
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Word of the Day
avaricious
Definition: (adjective) Immoderately desirous of wealth or gain.
Synonyms: covetous, grabby, grasping, greedy, prehensile.
Usage: The avaricious man prayed to have a room full of gold.
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r understanding of how IE words entered Sinitic already by the 1st millennium or even earlier, not that these words just somehow magically showed up of their own volition, but that they came through some sort of agency, undoubtedly human. What could be more human than language?
6. I applaud Frühauf for his awareness of these vital issues and, being the responsible scholar that he is, treating them seriously.
A few closing words
Manfred Frühauf's extraordinary German annotated translation of MTZZ is manifestly important for its linguistic virtuosity and philological precision, but is also significant for what it tells us about early travel to and trade with Central and Inner Asia (presumably all the way to the Pamir Mountains), the movement and migration of cultures and peoples, archeology before it arose as a modern discipline, the development of Chinese fiction (a historical romance; an epic manqué), and so many other fascinating subjects, including a unique brand of mythology that is quite different from that of the Shānhǎi jīng 山海經 (Classic of Mountains and Seas), a sort of mythic geography and bestiary, which also dealt with the same regions and dates to around the same time (see Nienhauser's perceptive remarks about the distinctions between the two works in item 1. of the bibliography below).
Brief bibliography
For those who wish to know more about the contents and composition of as well as the commentaries on MTZZ, together with its textual history, the following succinct treatments are available:
1. William H. Nienhauser, Jr., in WHN, et al., ed., The Indiana Companion to Tradtiional Chinese Literature (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986), pp. 632b-633b.
2. Rémi Mathieu, in Michael Loewe, ed., Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide (Berkeley: The Society for the Study of Early China and The Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California, Berkeley, 1993), pp. 342-346. In it, Mathieu akes this astute observation:
Thanks to its theme of a journey to the west, the book reflects a Chinese attempt to take possession of the whole earth, and raises the question of the control that a sovereign and his court may exercise over all people under the skies.
1. Ulrich Theobald, online in ChinaKnowledge.de — An Encyclopaedia on Chinese History, Literature and Art here (except for its mention of 1. and 2. above, based entirely on premodern and modern Chinese sources).
Table of contents (abbreviated, to give an idea of the riches available in the volume)
Foreword
Characters, transcription, orthography
1 Introduction to Mu Tianzi Zhuan
2 Mu Tianzi Zhuan 穆天子傳 ‒ Translation and commentary in six hefty chapters taking up more than half the book.
3 Individual observations
3.1 The Mu Tianzi Zhuan ‒ discovery and editing
3.2 Gaps in the Mu Tianzi Zhuan ‒ text fragments
3.3 On the biography of King Mu in the Western Zhou period
3.4 The book Liezi 列子 and Zhou King Mu
3.5 Liezi 列子 ‒ translation from Chapter III: Zhou Mu Wang pian 周穆王篇
3.6 Information in the Bamboo Annals 竹書紀年 Zhushu Jinian on the biography of the Zhou King Mu
3.7 Guo Pu 郭璞 (276‒324 AD) ‒ On his biography and his commentary
3.8 On the place names in the Mu Tianzi Zhuan
3.9 List of geographical names in the six chapters of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan
3.10 List of names of people, family associations and ethnic groups in the six chapters of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan
3.11 The name Ditai 帝臺、帝台
3.12 The Zhou kings Zhao and Mu ‒ on the 昭穆 Zhaomu question
3.13 The accusation of incest and other questions of legitimacy and morality
3.14 Calendar and event overview for the chapters I ‒ VI of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan
3.15 Observations from the translation work on the Mu Tianzi Zhuan as well as some remarks on the commentary literature
3.16 Some additional questions for the commentators as well as possible topics for further studies
3.17 Possibilities and limitations of a translation ‒ my translation of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan
4 Concluding remarks
5 Appendice[...]
ten Beschreibung der Trauerfeierlichkeiten während der Bestattung einer Favoritin des Königs.
Unabhängig von der Frage nach seiner Genrezugehörigkeit und seinen literarischen Qualitäten kann man das Mu Tianzi Zhuan als Schatzkammer voller Primärinformationen über diplomatische Aktivitäten in der chinesischen Bronzezeit ansehen, denn es berichtet ‒ aus der Perspektive des Zhou-Königshauses ‒ über Kontakte mit verschiedenen Familienverbänden, ethnischen Gruppen und fremden Völkern wie z. B. den Ximo, Yilü-Shi, Zhanhan-Shi, Guzhan-Shi, Chongyong-Shi u. a. Da das Mu Tianzi Zhuan ‒ vermutlich in der Ära der Kämpfenden Reiche (Zhanguo) ‒ in ein Grab eingelagert wurde, entging es der Bücherverbrennung 213 v. u. Z. durch Qin Shi Huang, denn der Text kam erst etwa um das Jahr 280 u. Z. wieder ans Tageslicht. Dies ist einer der Gründe, warum der Fund zu Beginn der Jìn-Dynastie große Aufmerksamkeit auf sich zog.
Allen Behauptungen über die Authentizität des Mu Tianzi Zhuan steht der offenkundige Mangel an archäologischen Funden entgegen, die diesen weit gesponnenen Reisebericht unterstützen würden. Tatsächlich spricht E. L. Shaughnessy vielmehr von einem generellen Rückzug in die Region der Hauptstadt in der Folge des in einer Katastrophe endenden Feldzugs König Zhao’s in den Süden, was ambitionierte Expeditionen in den fernen Westen ‒ wie anscheinend im Mu Tianzi Zhuan beschrieben ‒ unter seinem Sohn, König Mu, wenig wahrscheinlich macht. Andererseits konnte Shaughnessy nachweisen, daß die Namen einiger Personen, die in dem Reisebericht auftreten, auch auf ausgegrabenen Bronzegefäßen aus der Westlichen Zhou-Zeit ‒ datiert auf die Ära König Mu’s ‒ belegt sind, obwohl sie in der orthodoxen klassischen chinesischen Literatur fehlen.
This German translation is the first new rendering of MTZZ into a Western language after more than forty years, complemented by copious annotations discussing linguistic, paleographic, historical, social, technical and other questions. It was published open access about a week ago by de Gruyter (2024) and appears under the title of Überlieferungen von Mu, dem Sohn des Himmels: Eine philologisch-historische Studie zum MU TIANZI ZHUAN 穆天子傳 as vol. 38 in the "Worlds of East Asia" series from the Swiss Asia Society.
The translator, annotator, and explicator of MTZZ into German is Manfred W. Frühauf, who was a brilliant teacher of Classical and Modern Chinese at the University of Frankfurt during the years 1983-5, when he worked on his outstanding dissertation on early forms of Chinese autobiography.
Before that, i.e., in the 70s and 80s, he spent a number of years in Taiwan and Japan, first as a student, then also as a language teacher, it seems. He also learned Turkish and, I believe, some other Central Asian Turkic languages along the way. With his near-native command of modern Mandarin, he moved on to become the director of the China Section at the Landesspracheninstitut (LSI) Nordhrein-Westfalen at Bochum around 1984/5, Germany's most important training center for Russian and Asian languages, which offers intensive courses for diplomats, business and media people, and so forth.
Accordingly, most of Frühauf's professional life after the Ph.D. was focused on TCFL. He thus has some related publications in German, e.g., on proverbs, and a very useful dictionary of measure word collocations. Later, the LSI became a self-governed entity within the University of Bochum, after which Frühauf published a book on Guo Moruo 郭沫若 and is currently investigating the early work by Hu Shih 胡適 from the period 1917‒1919. He retired from the LIS a decade or so ago, which gave him more time to work on his pre-modern projects again, hence, MTZZ. He has also found time to do interesting work on the "Gǔshī shíjiǔ shǒu 古詩十九首" ("Nineteen Old Poems"). And, during the course of preparation for his remarkable annotated and explicated translation of MTZZ, he carried out specialized[...]
Language Log
This is just to say
A poem by Dan Perkins:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/PerkinsBearPoem.png
You'll need to be signed into a bluesky account to follow the link, which is why I presented it as a .png.
And you'll need to know the the background story about RFK Jr. and the bear cub — see e.g. "RFK Jr admits dumping bear carcass in New York's Central Park", BBC 8/5/2024, or his own video posted on X:
Looking forward to seeing how you spin this one, @NewYorker… pic.twitter.com/G13taEGzba
— Robert F. Kennedy Jr (@RobertKennedyJr) August 4, 2024
And finally, you need to recall the William Carlos Williams poem "This Is Just To Say":
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
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Word of the Day
Word of the Day: incinerate
This word has appeared in five articles on NYTimes.com in the past year. Can you use it in a sentence?
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Phrasal Verb of the Day | Vocabulary | EnglishClub
finish up
to be in a certain place or situation after a long series of events or a long time
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Word of the Day
stalwart
Definition: (adjective) Having or marked by imposing physical strength.
Synonyms: hardy, sturdy, stout.
Usage: Athos sprang into the boat, which was immediately pushed off and which soon sped seawards under the efforts of four stalwart rowers.
Discuss
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Language Log
Watermarking AI output, again
Deepa Seetharaman & Matt Barnum, "There’s a Tool to Catch Students Cheating With ChatGPT. OpenAI Hasn’t Released It.", WSJ 8/4/2024:
OpenAI has a method to reliably detect when someone uses ChatGPT to write an essay or research paper. The company hasn’t released it despite widespread concerns about students using artificial intelligence to cheat.
The project has been mired in internal debate at OpenAI for roughly two years and has been ready to be released for about a year, according to people familiar with the matter and internal documents viewed by The Wall Street Journal. “It’s just a matter of pressing a button,” one of the people said.
What OpenAI wrote on 5/7/2024 — "Understanding the source of what we see and hear online" ("Update on August 4, 2024") — suggests that the method is relatively easy to circumvent:
* Our teams have developed a text watermarking method that we continue to consider as we research alternatives.
* While it has been highly accurate and even effective against localized tampering, such as paraphrasing, it is less robust against globalized tampering; like using translation systems, rewording with another generative model, or asking the model to insert a special character in between every word and then deleting that character – making it trivial to circumvention by bad actors.
* Another important risk we are weighing is that our research suggests the text watermarking method has the potential to disproportionately impact some groups. For example, it could stigmatize use of AI as a useful writing tool for non-native English speakers.
See also Umar Shakir, "Google’s invisible AI watermark will help identify generative text and video", The Verge 5/14/2024:
Google’s DeepMind CEO, Demis Hassabis, took the stage for the first time at the Google I/O developer conference on Tuesday to talk not only about the team’s new AI tools, like the Veo video generator, but also about the new upgraded SynthID watermark imprinting system. It can now mark video that was digitally generated as well as AI-generated text.
Some details are available on Google Deep Mind's SynthID page:
Finding a robust solution to watermarking AI-generated text that doesn’t compromise the quality, accuracy and creative output has been a great challenge for AI researchers. To solve this problem, our team developed a technique that embeds a watermark directly into the process that a large language model (LLM) uses for generating text.
An LLM generates text one token at a time. These tokens can represent a single character, word or part of a phrase. To create a sequence of coherent text, the model predicts the next most likely token to generate. These predictions are based on the preceding words and the probability scores assigned to each potential token. […]
This process is repeated throughout the generated text, so a single sentence might contain ten or more adjusted probability scores, and a page could contain hundreds. The final pattern of scores for both the model’s word choices combined with the adjusted probability scores are considered the watermark. This technique can be used for as few as three sentences. And as the text increases in length, SynthID’s robustness and accuracy increases.
Obviously this method depends on knowing what release of what generative model was used. And even then, the same "globalized tampering" interventions will presumably work here as well — though if and when these methods are generally accessible and used, naive cheaters will be caught.
Another approach — alas even easier for "bad actors" to circumvent — is the Content Authenticity Initiative and the C2PA protocol. This protocol is analogous to (various countries') food labeling requirements.
Last year's LLOG AI Watermarking posts:
“Watermarking text”, 7/25/2023
“ROT-LLM?”, 7/28/2023
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ape of Uzbekistan does indeed have the potential to enhance our understanding of the lifeways of both nomads and sedentary communities in the region, so should be welcomed.
However, Wang’s arguments for seriously reevaluating the role of the Yuezhi in founding the Kushan Empire are less helpful. It is impossible to definitively attribute graves discovered in the region to the Yuezhi, although Wang seems confident in doing so. Even the so-called podboi tombs discovered by Russian and Chinese archaeologists at various locations corresponding with the itinerary of Yuezhi migration as outlined in the Han sources cannot be definitively attributed to the Yuezhi, although the description in the article of the tombs discovered by Wang around Chinortepa (‘where corpses were buried in underground pits with little chambers to their side’) does sound remarkably like podboi tombs. Podbois have also been excavated in Gansu in Western China and in Bactria by archaeologists over the past several decades. Those found in Bactria can be tentatively dated to the period of probable Yuezhi occupation of the region, and they have yielded a range of artifacts associated with militarized nomads, including swords and daggers, mirrors, jewelry and belt-buckles. But the artifacts apparently discovered by Wang at Chinortepa and used to illustrate the article – a ceramic vase, an unidentified bronze coin, and a ‘Kushan eggshell kept in a cigarette packet’ (?) – are hardly conclusive in providing any sort of attribution to the tombs.
Wang then contrasts these podboi tombs with other types of tombs his team has discovered near Kushan fortresses (which ones are not identified in the article) that apparently show evidence of Zoroastrian funerary practices. This leads Wang to the conclusion that ‘the Yuezhi and the founders of the Kushan empire weren’t the same people’. Wang believes that the Chinor graves were those of either local farmers who had been influenced by the Yuezhi, or Yuezhi who had integrated into farm life. He concludes that the Yuezhi weren’t bloodthirsty colonizers but ‘rather coexisted peacefully with the local population’. This latter conclusion is undoubtedly correct, and in no way at odds with our understanding of Yuezhi occupation of the region. I reached a similar conclusion in my 2007 monograph on the Yuezhi:
After the disruption and uncertainty of continuous migration, the (Yuezhi) had arrived in a fertile region ideally suited to irrigation agriculture and animal husbandry, and here they intended to stay. These were not transitory, destructive, migratory invaders, but a large confederation of semi-sedentised pastoralists and agriculturists intent upon occupying, controlling and facilitating the continuing prosperity of the Surkhan Darya region. Hence they were careful of the crop lands, established themselves near to the strategic river crossings, and occupied at least one (and probably several) of the pre-existing fortified settlements as a base from which to complete their subjugation both of the northern Bactrian region, and de facto of the former Greco-Bactrian realm south of the Amu Darya. … The ruling Yuezhi dynasty itself would have seen another advantage in leaving pre-existing crop lands unmolested – they knew how to exploit them by taking modest tributes so as not to undermine the wealth of rural populations. (C. Benjamin, 2007, p. 204)
Scholars of ancient Central Asia, particularly of Yuezhi and Kushan studies, should welcome the work of joint Chinese-Uzbek archaeological teams in the region. Important archaeological discoveries have been made in the region in the past but these have been piecemeal lately and we should all hope that this Chinese interest in the region yields new discoveries that help further flesh out the compelling tale unfolded by the authors of the Han Dynasty chronicles, supported by the work of so many archaeologists, numismatists and language specialists. But such discoveries must not be interpreted according to nationalist political [...]
Word of the Day
Word of the Day: labyrinthine
This word has appeared in 61 articles on NYTimes.com in the past year. Can you use it in a sentence?
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Phrasal Verb of the Day | Vocabulary | EnglishClub
march on
to walk in a group towards a place in order to protest against something or to demand something
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Language Log
Phoshime
Jeffrey L. Schwartz (cf. "Durian pizza" [10/18/19]) posted this photo on Facebook, showing a midtown Manhattan Asian fusion restaurant called Phoshime:
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Slang of the Day | Vocabulary | EnglishClub
ute
a pickup truck
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Idiom of the Day
last chance (for/at/to do something)
The last or final opportunity to get, have, do, or achieve something. Watch the video
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s
5.1 Table of the ten ‘heavenly stems’ (Tian’gan 天干 ) and twelve ‘earthly branches’ (Dizhi 地支 )
5.2 The Chinese 60s cycle (Jiazi) formed from the combination of the 10 ‘heavenly stems’ (Tian’gan 天干 ) with the 12 ‘earthly branches’ (Dizhi 地支 )
5.3 List of selected special characters for the Mu Tianzi Zhuan
5.4 List of abbreviations for chapters I ‒ VI of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan (without book title and author name) 5.5 Bibliography of secondary literature in Western languages for the study of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan presented here
5.6 Bibliography of non-Western languages
6 The text of the Mu Tianzi Zhuan in the Chinese original
6.1 穆天子傳卷一 Mu Tianzi Zhuan • Chapter I
6.2 穆天子傳卷二 Mu Tianzi Zhuan • Chapter II
6.3 穆天子傳卷三 Mu Tianzi Zhuan • Chapter III
6.4 The Book of the Three Kings Mu Tianzi Zhuan • Chapter IV
6.5 The Book of the Three Kings Mu Tianzi Zhuan • Chapter V
6.6 The Book of the Three Kings Mu Tianzi Zhuan • Chapter VI
Brief biography of the author
Index of selected names, titles and terms (11 double-columned pages)
Miscellanea
The silk road is mentioned on pp. XII, 385, 408, 547, 673; 1208, most prominently in the introdcution where Frühauf describes his own travels in Xinjiang in 1976 and 1980, when he first heard about the MTZZ.
Frühauf mentions the Tocharians several times, e.g., when discussing theethnonyms Yuezhi 月氏，Yuezhi 禺知, and Daxia 大夏 (Greco-Bactria) and the proposed linguistic identifications for them.
The volume was published open access about a week ago. Here it is (pdf) for your reading pleasure, all 1,214 pages of it
There are over a thousand footnotes in the main part of the book, plus hundreds more for the separate sections at the back of the book.
Selected readings
* "Yuezhi archeology without concern for Tocharian language" (8/4/24)
* "Rethinking the Yuezhi?" (8/5/24)
* "Kunlun: the origins and meanings of a mysterious place name" (2/24/21)
* "Yuezhi archeology without concern for Tocharian language" (8/4/24)
* "Persian peaches of immortality" (1/22/21)
* Porter, Deborah Lynn. From Deluge to Discourse: Myth, History, and the Generation of Chinese Fiction. Albany: State University of New York, 1996.
* Knauer, Elfriede R. (2006). "The Queen Mother of the West: A Study of the Influence of Western Prototypes on the Iconography of the Taoist Deity". In Mair, Victor H. (ed.). Contact and Exchange in the Ancient World. Honolulu: University of Hawaiʻi Press. pp. 62–115.
[Thanks to Wolfgang Behr]
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research on such topics as the mythology and astronomy of that challenging text, for which see his chapter in the 65th birthday Festschrift for Heiner Roetz (Bochum Yearbook of East Asian Studies [BJOAF]) , 38 (2015), which is prefaced by the following English abstract: Mu tianzi zhuan is China’s oldest travelogue, purportedly dating back to the 10th century B. C. There has long been a debate over its authenticity and date of origin. Its literary character or type is also a point of contention: is it a travelogue moulded into a certain literary form (irrespective of whether the events reported in it are authentic or fictional)? Was it written by an ancient court historiographer who intended it to serve as a historical source document? In the present article three examples from the travelogue are presented to demonstrate that the ancient text contains a number of elements with astronomical implications, which suggest that yet another perspective should be taken into consideration, namely the astral-mythological approach of von Dechend & de Santillana, to achieve a new and deeper interpretation of the text.
I am particularly intrigued that a Sinologist working on a 1st millennium BC Chinese text would know about the esoteric research in Hamlet's Mill and use it productively to interpret the astronomical and mythological phenomena in it.
When all is said and done, how does Frühauf's MTZZ translation stack up against previous renditions in Western languages? In a word, it is a philological triumph. The last complete translation of MTZZ was that into French by Rémi Mathieu, published in 1978. I was already quite impressed by that version, but it is more literary and cultural, whereas Frühauf's is more technical and linguistic. Prior to Mathieu was Cheng Te-k'un's in JNCBRAS, 64-65 (1933-34), which I read years before Mathieu's version appeared. Cheng's rendition was so disappointing that I could barely force myself through a few pages. E. J. Eitel's translation of 1888 in China Review was issued before Sinology had become a science and was rather sketchy.
Mathieu's translation, like many others he did, is very good, informed by the major commentaries and obviously eloquent enough to convince major French publishing houses to publish them, but they do not dig as deeply into the philology of difficult passages as Frühauf does. He is familiar with a wider range of the secondary literature, including Japanese, and passionately interested in the philological "ancillary sciences" like astronomy, archaeology, historical geography, etc., which are eminently important to understand a fragmentary text like MTZZ with its complicated transmission history, hapax characters, etc. He is also more familiar with the Central Asian connections which are so important for an understanding of the text.
That brings me to my final series of points. Namely,
1. we may view MTZZ as a hoary forerunner of the famous vernacular novel, Journey to the West, written around two millennia later and featuring the fictionalized medieval Buddhist pilgrim, Xuanzang (Tripitaka), and his three inimitable companions — Pigsy, Sandy, and Monkey (who has many similarities to Hanuman in the Indian epic Ramayana) — plus a White Dragon Horse. Incidentally, a team of eight horses figure prominently in MTZZ.
2. the route described is like a precursor of the "Silk Road" before there was trade in silk, though there was plenty of jade (plus horses, furs, faience, glass, etc. coming in the opposite direction)
3. it was these aspects (1. and 2.) that drew Frühauf to Central Asia and attracted him to MTZZ
4. King Mu was traversing the same area as the Tocharians and the Yuezhi must have passed through around the same time (first millennium BC). If we read the narrative and descriptions of MTZZ attentively enough, we may gain valuable insights into who, after all, the Tocharians were, and who, after all, the Yuezhi were.
5. If we are truly open-minded and percipient enough, we may also obtain a better, cleare[...]
Language Log
Magisterial German translation of a neglected monument of ancient Chinese literature, Mu Tianzi Zhuan
First, a few words about the text, after which I will introduce the Sinologist who undertook this monumental philological task, Manfred W. Frühauf.
English:
The Mu Tianzi Zhuan, or Records of [King] Mu, the Son of Heaven, is considered to be the earliest and longest extant travelogue in Chinese literature. It describes the journeys of King Mu (r. 976-922 BC or 956-918 BC) of the Zhou Dynasty (c.1046-256 BC) to the farthest corners of his realm and beyond in the 10th century BC. Harnessing his famous eight noble steeds he visits distant clans and nations such as the Quanrong, Chiwu, and Jusou, exchanging gifts with all of them; he scales the awe-inspiring Kunlun mountains and meets with legendary Xiwangmu ("Queen Mother of the West"); he watches exotic animals, and he orders his men to mine huge quantities of precious jade for transport back to his capital. The travelogue ends with a detailed account of the mourning ceremonies during the burial of a favorite lady of the king.
Irrespective of the question of its literary specifics and merits, the Mu Tianzi Zhuan (MTZZ) may be regarded as a treasure house of primary source information on Chinese Bronze Age diplomacy, describing contacts with various clans, ethnic groups, and foreign peoples such as the Ximo, Yilü-Shi, Zhanhan-Shi, Guzhan-Shi, Chongyong-Shi etc., from a Zhou dynasty perspective. Stored in a grave probably in the Warring States era (c.475-221 BC) , the Mu Tianzi Zhuan escaped the burning of books by Qin Shi Huang ("First Emperor of the Qin [Dynasty]" [and hence of China]) in the year 213 BC, as it came back to daylight only around 280 AD. This is one of the reasons why this find was considered a great discovery at the beginning of the Jìn dynasty (226-420). All claims to the authenticity of the travelogue are weakened by the obvious dearth of archeological finds corroborating the far-flung travelogue. Edward L. Shaughnessy speaks of a general retreat to the capital area in the aftermath of the catastrophic failure of King Zhao’s (1027-957 BC) expedition to the South, which makes large scale expeditions of his son, King Mu, into the far West — as seemingly described in the Mu Tianzi Zhuan — rather unlikely. On the other hand, Shaughnessy has also shown that the names of several persons mentioned in the travelogue can also be found on excavated Western Zhou bronzes dated to the era of King Mu, persons whose names are not attested elsewhere in orthodox classical Chinese literature.
German
Das Mu Tianzi Zhuan, übersetzbar als „Überlieferungen von [König] Mu, den Sohn des Himmels“, gilt als ältester erhaltener Reisebericht in der chinesischen Literaturgeschichte. Darin werden die Reisen beschrieben, die König Mu, fünfter Herrscher der dynastischen Zhou, im 10. Jahrhundert v. u. Z. zu den entferntesten Orten seines Reiches und darüber hinaus unternommen haben soll. Mit einem Gespann aus den berühmten acht edlen Pferden besucht er weit entfernte Familienclans und Völkerschaften wie z. B. die Quanrong, Chiwu oder Jusou und tauscht mit ihnen allen Geschenke aus. Er besteigt das Ehrfurcht gebietende Kunlun-Gebirge und trifft mit der legendären Xiwangmu zusammen. Er beobachtet exotische Tiere, und er befiehlt seinen Männern, große Mengen wertvoller Jade zu brechen und in seine Hauptstadt zu bringen. Fast sprichwörtlich geworden ist die Feststellung im antiken Zuozhuan, wonach „einst König Mu … eine Reise durch die ganze Welt (tianxia) unternehmen [wollte], auf daß sich überall seine Wagenspuren und die Hufabdrücke seiner Pferde fänden.“ Der Reisebericht endet mit einer detaillier[...]
Language Log
The wisdom of puns
Recent stock-market volatility reminds us of this KAL cartoon:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/SellBuy.png
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Slang of the Day | Vocabulary | EnglishClub
psycho
crazy, insane
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Idiom of the Day
in the last analysis
When everything has been considered; when all the facts are known or the truth has come to light. Watch the video
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Language Log
Skinning a bear with Rosanne Barr
…vs. having a video conversation with her…
Attachment ambiguity of the week: "RFK Jr. says he dumped dead bear in Central Park after ditching plan to skin it in bizarre video with Roseanne Barr", NY Post 8/4/2024.
The Berkeley Neural Parser thinks that he planned to skin the bear in a video with Rosanne Barr:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/BarrBear1.png
(Presumably with her as co-skinner with him, not co-skinnee with the bear…)
But of course the headline writer meant for the PP "with Rosanne Barr" to modify "a bizarre video", and for the resulting PP "in a bizarre video with Rosanne Barr" to modify "RFK Jr. says [he dumped dead bear in Central Park after ditching plan to skin it]".
SpaCy comes to the same conclusion.
[h/t J.W. Brewer]
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and cultural ideology. Wang seems conscious of this when responding to a question from the WSJ author about whether Beijing could use a reinterpretation of the Yuezhi to make territorial claims in the region. Wang replies, ‘Such a notion was absurd because the nomads are a historical people and no one serious would put forth that argument’.
Yet at the same time Wang seems to be promoting an implausible nationalistic claim of Uzbek responsibility for the establishment of the Kushan Empire. Wang notes that his results ‘match up with the needs of China and Uzbekistan’, and the article concludes with the following statement: ‘Being able to trace the origins of the Kushan Empire to local people rather than outsiders feeds a tale of national resurgence after a period of foreign dominance that lines up favorably with Uzbekistan’s post-Soviet efforts to write its own history’. Undoubtedly many thousands of local people – farmers, merchants and urban residents – were a significant element of the demographic makeup of the multicultural Kushan Empire, which stretched from Uzbekistan to the Ganges, and from the Iranian Plateau to Xinjiang. But to claim the founders of the empire were Uzbeks half a millennium before Turkic-speaking peoples even began to make their mark on the stage of Eurasian history does no service whatsoever to the credibility of the exciting and flourishing modern nation of Uzbekistan.
Craig Benjamin
benjamic@gvsu.edu
5 August 2024
Brief Bibliography
* Benjamin, C., The Yuezhi: Origin, Migration and the Conquest of Northern Bactria, Silk Roads Studies Series vol. XIV, Turnhout: Brepols, 2007.
* Falk, H., ed., Proceedings of the Symposium on the History of the Kushans on the Basis of Literary Evidence, Seminaris Conference Center, Berlin, December 2013, Mainz: Mainz Academy of Literature and Culture, 2016.
* Hill, J., Through the Jade Gate to Rome: A Study of the Silk Roads 1st to 2nd Centuries CE, Vol. I, 2nd edition. An annotated translation from the Houhan Shu, John E. Hill, 2015.
* Hulsewe, A.F.P. and Loewe, M.A.N., China in Central Asia. The Early Stage: 125B.C. – A.D. 23. An Annotated Translation of Chapters 61 and 96 of the History of the Former Han Dynasty, Leiden: Brill, 1979.
* Litvinsky, B.A. and Altman-Bromberg, C., ‘The Archaeology and Art of Central Asia: Studies from the Former Soviet Union’, Bulletin of the Asia Institute 8 (1996).
* Mallory, J.P. and Mair, V.H., The Tarim Mummies: Ancient China and the Mystery of the Earliest Peoples from the West, London: Thames and Hudson, 2000.
* Sima Qian, Shi Ji (trans. B. Watson), Records of the Grand Historian by Sima Qian – Han Dynasty II, New York: Columbia University Press, Revised edtn. 1993.
* Zadneprovsky, Y.A., ‘Migration Paths of the Yueh-chih based on Archaeological Evidence’, Circle of Inner Asian Art Newsletter No. 9 (April 1999) pp. 3 ff.
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Language Log
Rethinking the Yuezhi?
[This is a guest post by Craig Benjamin, the leading authority on Yuezhi history. It is a follow-up to "Yuezhi archeology without concern for Tocharian language" (8/4/24)]
"China Reaches Back in Time to Challenge the West. Way, Way Back: The country’s archaeologists are striking out along the Silk Road to trace the reach of ancient Chinese civilization, disputing long-held beliefs", by Sha Hua, WSJ (7/29/24).
A recent article published in the Wall Street Journal concerning attempts by Chinese and Uzbek archaeologists to unearth material evidence of the Yuezhi and early Kushans makes interesting reading. The author prefaces their account by placing the work of the archaeologists in the context of Xi Jinping’s efforts to expand the scope and influence of Chinese civilization, arguing that the efforts of Chinese researchers in various global locations ‘has the potential to change the field of archaeology itself, along with China’s place in the sweep of human history’. However, rather than promoting the influence of Chinese civilization in Central Asia, the archaeologists appear to be intent upon advancing nationalist claims in support of China’s Belt and Road partner Uzbekistan by arguing, on the basis of very slender evidence, that the Kushans ‘were descendants of the local population’.
The article focuses on the work of Wang Jianxin, a Chinese archaeologist based at Northwest University in Xi'an. Wang has apparently long been fascinated with the Silk Roads, and in particular with the impact of the migration of the Yuezhi from the borderlands of ancient northwestern China to Bactria, essentially southern Uzbekistan and northern Afghanistan today. According to the article, Wang and his team have been digging for several years in Uzbekistan, most recently at a site known as Chinortepa, close to the so-called Iron Gates of ancient Sogdia. The article states that, based on the artifacts he has discovered and the location of these discoveries, Wang now believes that our understanding of the nature and role of the Yuezhi in the history of ancient Central Asia might be incorrect, and that the Yuezhi might not have been founders of the Kushan Empire after all.
Such a startling thesis, which is clearly at odds with the consensus view held by most Yuezhi specialists, needs to be evaluated in light of the evidence Wang has assembled. Wang’s assertion that the field of Silk Roads Studies is dominated by Western scholars, and that it was time to ‘add China’s voice to the field’ might hold some merit, but it is hardly the fault of Western (and also Russian and Japanese) scholars if Chinese interest in the field has been slow to develop. And of course it is ancient Han Chinese annals – the Shiji, Han Shu and Hou Han Shu – that are fundamental to the story of the Yuezhi and their role in founding the Kushan Empire. None the less, Western scholars should welcome greater Chinese engagement in the field.
According to the article, after Wang signed an agreement with the Uzbek Academy of Sciences in Samarkand, the joint Chinese-Uzbek team unearthed ‘dozens of hitherto unknown nomadic settlements in Uzbekistan, stunning other archaeologists in the field’. It would be helpful if reports of these stunning discoveries were more widely disseminated through appropriate academic journals because so far information on these excavations has been difficult to access. The article’s implication that these settlements can be attributed to the Yuezhi is apparently based on Wang’s skill in ‘using rock paintings to identify sites’, but to the best of this author’s knowledge rock paintings (petroglyphs?) are not something generally associated with Yuezhi mortuary sites. But Wang’s reported preference of searching for graves ‘in flat terrain, orchards or farmland’ rather than digging up the numerous tepe mounds that dot the landsc[...]
Slang of the Day | Vocabulary | EnglishClub
flame
to attack someone by posting an abusive message in an online forum or message board
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Idiom of the Day
lap of the gods
A state beyond possible human control, intervention, or responsibility; a state or condition that is or will be decided by nature or fate. Usually used in the phrase "in the lap of the gods." Watch the video
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