Old National Pronunciation Explained

Old National Pronunciation
Familycolor:	Sino-Tibetan
Fam2:	Sinitic
Fam3:	Chinese
Fam4:	Mandarin
Ancestor:	Middle Mandarin

pronounced as /notice/

The Old National Pronunciation was the system established for the phonology of standard Chinese as decided by the Commission on the Unification of Pronunciation from 1913 onwards, and published in the 1919 edition of the Guóyīn Zìdiǎn (Chinese: 國音字典, "Dictionary of National Pronunciation"). Although it was mainly based on the phonology of the Beijing dialect, it was also influenced by historical forms of northern Mandarin as well as other varieties of Mandarin and even some varieties of Wu Chinese.

The artificial nature of the system proved impractical,^[1] and in 1926 a decision was made to normalize the pronunciations to the natural pronunciations found in Beijing, which resulted in a revised Guóyīn Chángyòng Zìhuì (Chinese: 國音常用字匯, "Vocabulary of National Pronunciation for Everyday Use") published in 1932.^[2]

Phonology

The Old National Pronunciation was similar to the phonology of the Beijing dialect, but with four additional distinctions derived from Middle Chinese that were still maintained in other dialects:

Three more initials, derived from the initials of Middle Chinese: Chinese: {{linktext|微 pronounced as /link/, Chinese: {{linktext|疑 as two initials, pronounced as /link/ and pronounced as /link/.
Preservation of the "round-sharp distinction" . The alveolo-palatal initials of the Beijing dialect (pronounced as //tɕ, tɕʰ, ɕ//), written in pinyin as j, q and x, originated in a merger between velar initials (pronounced as //k, kʰ, x//) and alveolar affricates (pronounced as //ts, tsʰ, s//) before the front vowels pronounced as /link/ and pronounced as /link/. In the Old National Pronunciation, the former group were treated as palatals, but the latter group remained as alveolars.
A distinction between pronounced as //e// and pronounced as //o//.^[3]
Preservation of the checked tone . Although how it was to be realized was not specifically detailed in the original dictionary, it was often pronounced with a final glottal stop, as in Lower Yangtze Mandarin varieties such as the Nanjing dialect.

The actual phonetic values of these tones were not prescribed in the 1919 edition of the Dictionary of National Pronunciation. Although various proposals of merging values from different areas of China were raised, the de facto standard was to use the tonal system of Beijing, and to simply read the entering tone (which the Beijing dialect lacked as a distinctive tone) as a shortened departing tone, falling in nature, as shown from sets of gramophone recordings of Wang Pu, a member of the Commission, and of noted linguist Yuen Ren Chao.^[4]

Example pronunciations
Character	ONP		Standard Mandarin						Middle Chinese
Character	IPA	Pinyin	IPA	Pinyin	IPA	Pinyin	IPA	Wugniu	Middle Chinese
Chinese: {{linktext\|我 "I, me"	pronounced as //ŋo//	ngo	/wo/	wǒ	pronounced as //o//	o	pronounced as //ŋəu//	ngou	ngaX
Chinese: {{linktext\|年 "year"	pronounced as //ɲian//	gnian	/njɛn/	nián	pronounced as //lien//	liän	pronounced as //ɲi//	gni	nen
Chinese: {{linktext\|京 "capital"	pronounced as //tɕiŋ//	jing	/tɕiŋ/	jīng	pronounced as //tɕin//	jin	pronounced as //tɕin//	cin	kjaeng
Chinese: {{linktext\|精 "pure"	pronounced as //tsiŋ//	zing	/tɕiŋ/	jīng	pronounced as //tsin//	zin	pronounced as //tsin//	tsin	tsjeng
Chinese: {{linktext\|一 "one"	pronounced as //iʔ//	i	/i/	yī	pronounced as //iʔ//	i	pronounced as //iəʔ//	iq	ʔjit

Phonetic symbols

The notation used to indicate the prescribed pronunciation was zhuyin zimu (also known as zhuyin fuhao, as adopted by the Commission on the Unification of Pronunciation.^[5]

In the following tables, the zhuyin fuhao symbols are shown with equivalents in the IPA and modern pinyin (where applicable).

!Bilabial!Alveolar!Retroflex!(Alveolo)-
Palatal!Velar
Nasal		Chinese: ㄇ pronounced as /link/ m	Chinese: ㄋ pronounced as /link/ n		Chinese: ㄬ pronounced as /link/ gn	Chinese: ㄫ pronounced as /link/ ng
Stop	unaspirated	Chinese: ㄅ pronounced as /link/ b	Chinese: ㄉ pronounced as /link/ d			Chinese: ㄍ pronounced as /link/ g
Stop	aspirated	Chinese: ㄆ pronounced as /[pʰ]/ p	Chinese: ㄊ pronounced as /[tʰ]/ t			Chinese: ㄎ pronounced as /[kʰ]/ k
Affricate	unaspirated		Chinese: ㄗ pronounced as /link/ z	Chinese: ㄓ pronounced as /link/ zh	Chinese: ㄐ pronounced as /link/ j
Affricate	aspirated		Chinese: ㄘ pronounced as /[tsʰ]/ c	Chinese: ㄔ pronounced as /[ʈʂʰ]/ ch	Chinese: ㄑ pronounced as /[tɕʰ]/ q
Fricative	voiceless	Chinese: ㄈ pronounced as /link/ f	Chinese: ㄙ pronounced as /link/ s	Chinese: ㄕ pronounced as /link/ sh	Chinese: ㄒ pronounced as /link/ x	Chinese: ㄏ pronounced as /link/ h
Fricative	voiced	Chinese: ㄪ pronounced as /link/ v		Chinese: ㄖ pronounced as /link/ r
Lateral			Chinese: ㄌ pronounced as /link/ l

Finals
		Chinese: ㄚ	Chinese: ㄛ	Chinese: ㄝ	Chinese: ㄞ		Chinese: ㄟ	Chinese: ㄠ	Chinese: ㄡ	Chinese: ㄢ	Chinese: ㄣ	Chinese: ㄤ	Chinese: ㄥ	Chinese: ㄦ
	[ɨ] i	[a] a	[ɔ] o	[ɛ] ê	[aɪ] ai	[ɤ] e	[eɪ] ei	[ɑʊ] ao	[oʊ] ou	[an] an	[ən] en	[ɑŋ] ang	[əŋ] eng	[əɻ] er
Chinese: ㄧ	[i] i	[ia] ia	[iɔ] io	[iɛ]	[iaɪ] iai			[iɑʊ] iao	[iɔʊ] iu	[iɛn] ian	[in] in	[iɑŋ] iang	[iŋ] ing
Chinese: ㄨ	[u] u	[ua] ua	[uɔ] uo/o		[uaɪ] uai		[ueɪ] ui			[uan] uan	[uən] un	[uɑŋ] uang	[ʊŋ] ong
Chinese: ㄩ	[y] ü		[yɔ] üo	[yœ̜] üe						[yœ̜n] üan	[yn] ün		[iʊŋ] iong

The tone system used at the time was different from the modern version of zhuyin fuhao: the dark level tone was unmarked, and the light level, rising, departing and entering tone each had a single dot marked at the bottom left, top left, top right and bottom right corners respectively, thus resembling the tone-marking system of Middle Chinese to a large degree.

Notes and References

Wen-Chao Li . Chris . Conflicting notions of language purity: the interplay of archaising, ethnographic, reformist, elitist and xenophobic purism in the perception of Standard Chinese . Language & Communication . April 2004 . 24 . 2 . 97–133 . 10.1016/j.langcom.2003.09.002 . 18 June 2019.
Book: Chen. Ping. Modern Chinese: History and Sociolinguistics. 1999. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, U.K.. 9780521645720. 16–19. 1st. registration.
Web site: Chinese linguist, phonologist, composer and author, Yuen Ren Chao. Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley . 1974. interview by Rosemany Levenson.
Book: Ramsey. S. Robert. The languages of China. 1989. Princeton University Press. Princeton, N.J.. 9780691014685. 9. 2nd print., with revisions, and 1st Princeton pbk. print...
Book: Dong, Hongyuan. A History of the Chinese Language. Fisher. 133.