Editing Chinese language (section)

=== Old and Middle Chinese ===
{{Main|Old Chinese|Middle Chinese}}
{{Further|Reconstruction of Old Chinese}}
The earliest examples of Old Chinese are divinatory inscriptions on [[oracle bone]]s dated to {{circa|1250&nbsp;BCE}}, during the [[Late Shang]].{{sfnp|Schüssler|2007|p=1}} The next attested stage came from [[Chinese bronze inscriptions|inscriptions on bronze artifacts]] dating to the [[Western Zhou]] period (1046–771&nbsp;BCE), the ''[[Classic of Poetry]]'' and portions of the ''[[Book of Documents]]'' and ''[[I Ching]]''.{{sfnp|Baxter|1992|pp=2–3}} Scholars have attempted to reconstruct the [[phonology of Old Chinese]] by comparing later varieties of Chinese with the rhyming practice of the ''Classic of Poetry'' and the phonetic elements found in the majority of Chinese characters.{{sfnp|Norman|1988|pp=42–45}} Although many of the finer details remain unclear, most scholars agree that Old Chinese differs from Middle Chinese in lacking retroflex and palatal obstruents but having initial [[consonant cluster]]s of some sort, and in having voiceless nasals and liquids.{{sfnp|Baxter|1992|p=177}} Most recent reconstructions also describe an atonal language with consonant clusters at the end of the syllable, developing into [[tone (linguistics)|tone]] distinctions in Middle Chinese.{{sfnp|Baxter|1992|pp=181–183}} Several [[derivational affix]]es have also been identified, but the language lacks [[inflection]], and indicated grammatical relationships using word order and [[grammatical particle]]s.{{sfnp|Schüssler|2007|p=12}}

Middle Chinese was the language used during [[Northern and Southern dynasties]] and the [[Sui dynasty|Sui]], [[Tang dynasty|Tang]], and [[Song dynasty|Song]] dynasties (6th–10th centuries). It can be divided into an early period, reflected by the ''[[Qieyun]]'' rhyme dictionary (601), and a late period in the 10th century, reflected by [[rhyme table]]s such as the {{tlit|zh|[[Yunjing]]}} constructed by ancient Chinese philologists as a guide to the ''Qieyun'' system.{{sfnp|Baxter|1992|pp=14–15}} These works define phonological categories but with little hint of what sounds they represent.{{sfnp|Ramsey|1987|p=125}} Linguists have identified these sounds by comparing the categories with pronunciations in modern [[varieties of Chinese]], [[Sino-Xenic vocabularies|borrowed Chinese words]] in Japanese, Vietnamese, and Korean, and transcription evidence.{{sfnp|Norman|1988|pp=34–42}} The resulting system is very complex, with a large number of consonants and vowels, but they are probably not all distinguished in any single dialect. Most linguists now believe it represents a [[diasystem]] encompassing 6th-century northern and southern standards for reading the classics.{{sfnp|Norman|1988|p=24}}