Batu Gantong's Baba Malay translations of Chinese classics

[Sim]

Hi Casey,

>> I think this is what you are talking about.

Yes, exactly. And also sometimes just reading out a character with the most common Hokkien equivalent, because even though that character has a "real" (i.e. etymologically and phonetically related) equivalent, that word is either less common or has a different meaning in Hokkien than what is required by the context.

So, in a similar way to Mark's example, they would always say "lim" for "drink", even if the written word was "喝". In writing (as Mark says), they would probably write 飲.

Thanks for your contributions, btw, Casey. I enjoy reading them a lot.

Sim.

[Andrew]

Tang Min is 唐閩 and refers to the literary pronunciation of Hokkien. I don't know where the term originates, but if you do a search on Google groups for it you will find a lot of references.

Mark: Where did you get your Kangxi dictionary? How much was it, and is it one volume?

[hong]

Go to Shanghai book store in Jalan Petaling.The price should be aroud 60 .00.It is not useful for this version because there are no even putonghua pinyin for the words.The bigger version with 3 or 4 volumes will be at least 500.00 -900.00 renminbi.
If you want to spend this kind of money,I think it will be better to just buy a taiwanese minnan dict .

[hong]

What I mentioned above selling in Jalan Petaling is published by 上海古籍 without hanyupinyin.=RM65.00 .I saw it two weeks ago.If you want one volume version with hanyupinyin for putonghua,you have to send order to hongkong /china because I can't find bookshop in K L selling it.
www.hydcdcbs.com the price is 160 renminbi ,you can't find malaysian bookshop sell it for RM 80.00,it will still be around RM 160.00

[hong]

I think it should be shanghaicishu because the shanghaiguji version is also 160.00
www.unihan.com.cn/kangxi/zhuyin.htm

[niuc]

...For example, very clever " 很 聪 明 ", you may say "cin1 gau5", from three syllables to two.

Hi Casey , I understand your point above, yet 聪明 can (though may not always) be directly translated as chang1-mia*5, right? In my usage, chang1-mia*5 (lit. chong1-bing5) is more like "clever/intelligent, in academical sense", gau5 is the common word (wider meaning).

[hong]

For me it is purely you want to use this guhanyu word to become more hokkien-like but not in the sence of academic or wider use.I never use 聰明。
I have relatives who think like you about this word,it is too true。

[Mark Yong]

Mark: Where did you get your Kangxi dictionary? How much was it, and is it one volume?

I got both my copies from one of the Popular Bookstores in Penang. It is a single-volume hardcover with slightly under 1,600 pages. The cover is black, with the title printed in gold-colour. The publisher is 祥瑞文化公司. The other 100% identical copy I have is published by 泉源出版社. I cannot recall the exact price, but if I remember correctly, it was in the RM50-60 region. I bought them along with a whole bunch of Chinese Classics, all black hardcovers with gold-coloured titles. All of them are Taiwan-published.

Hong - I notice that most of the common words in Kangxi quote directly from 說文解字. Is it correct to assume that whatever is in 說文解字 would be in Kangxi? I read somewhere that 說文解字 was compiled about 1,000-plus years before Kangxi, and only had about 9,000 characters. I saw it in a bookstore and was tempted to get a copy.

[hong]

說文解字is 1900 years old in Han period.I already mentioned you need 100 volumes of it along with 1000 articles in journals along university theses for a full understanding of it.There is a copy RM 36.00 in Jalan Petaling popular bookstore without any commentary.The bookshop you mentioned has the commentary by 段玉裁in qing period but this is not enough because many other commentaries are a must
many of them pointed out the mistakes in 說文解字 .I don't know your version has a 2000 mistakes pointed out by a qing period scholar at the back.王力pointed 8000 mistakes in another book.
We cannot take this book too seriously because a meaning used by min people could be entirely ignored by them.
I think 9000 words in 說文解字 are surely in kangxizidian but 說文解字always say this word 讀如(X) which don't always appear iif I am not wrong.Some explantions also missing because the editors feel that other books do the job better. There is 反切 at that time but it is not popular yet.

[hong]

Sorry,I wanted to type 2000 /8000 mistakes about kangxizidian only not 說文解字。