John Chalmers (missionary) explained

John Chalmers (1825–1899) was a Scottish Protestant missionary in late Qing Dynasty China and translator.^[1] His work An English and Cantonese Pocket Dictionary (1859) popularized the term "Cantonese".^[2] Before 1859, Cantonese was referred in English as "the Canton dialect".^{[3] [2]}

Chalmers served with the London Missionary Society. He wrote several works on the Chinese language, including, in 1866, the first translation into English of Lao Tzu's Tao Te Ching (which he called the Tau Teh King).

John Chalmers
Birth Date:	24 October 1825
Birth Place:	New Deer, Aberdeenshire, Scotland
Death Place:	Incheon, South Korea

Works

• Chalmers. John. A Chinese Phonetic Vocabulary, Containing all the most common characters, with their sounds in the Canton Dialect. London Missionary Society's Press. Hong Kong. 1855. ^[4]
• Book: An English and Cantonese pocket dictionary: for the use of those who wish to learn the spoken language of Canton Province. John Chalmers. 1859. Printed at the London Missionary Society's Press. 159. 2011-07-06.
• Book: Chalmers, John. Origin of the Chinese. Hong Kong. 1866. De Souza & Co..
• Book: The Speculations on Metaphysics, Polity and Morality of "The Old Philosopher," Lau-tsze. John Chalmers. 1868. Trubner. London. 62. 2013-01-20.
• Book: An account of the structure of Chinese characters under 300 primary forms: after the Shwoh-wan, 100 A.D., and the phonetic Shwoh-wan, 1833. John Chalmers. 1882. Trübner & co.. 199. 2011-07-06.

References

• Book: American Presbyterian Mission . 1867 . Memorials of Protestant Missionaries to the Chinese. American Presbyterian Mission Press . Shanghai.
• Book: Broomhall, Alfred . Alfred James Broomhall . 1982 . Hudson Taylor and China's Open Century: Barbarians at the Gates . Hodder and Stoughton . London.

Notes and References

1. Book: Gerald H. Anderson. Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions. 1999. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. 978-0-8028-4680-8. 123.
2. Book: 晚清民初歐美傳教士書寫的廣東話文獻精選. 2022. Shin. Kataoka . Yin-Ping Cream. Lee. 25. Chinese University of Hong Kong.
3. Book: Han-fung's Record. Milne. William. William Milne (missionary). The Sacred Edict: Containing Sixteen Maxims of the Emperor Kang-Hi. 1817. xxvii-xxviii. bought with him the Paraphrase on the Sacred Edict [廣訓衍]... This interpretation was written in the northern dialect, ... on the first and fifteenth of the each moon, they might proclaim the original text in the Canton dialect.. https://archive.org/details/sacrededictconta00kangrich/. 2007-04-30.
4. Kataoka. Shin. Lee. Cream. A System without a System: Cantonese Romanization Used in Hong Kong Place and Personal Names. Hong Kong Journal of Applied Linguistics 11,1. 79–98. 2008.