梵汉对音与中古汉语全浊声母的音读问题

Sanskrit-Chinese Transliteration and the Pronunciation of Voiced Initials in Middle Ancient Chinese

中古音或《切韵》音系的全浊声母的实际音读是否送气是汉语音韵学里一个有争论的问题。要推求中古时期全浊声母的实际音读,仅靠历史比较法是有一定局限的,梵汉对音研究弥补了这一缺陷。梵汉对音的事实告诉我们,中古音或《切韵》音系的全浊声母在当时的实际口语中应有送气、不送气两种读法,而送气、不送气这两种读法并不具有辨义功能。中古音或《切韵》音系的全浊声母送气、不送气这两种读法的特点在今天的吴方言中依然保留,应是语音发展的历史遗留。

It is still a controversial issue in Chinese phonology whether the actual pronunciation of voiced initials in the middle ancient Chinese and the phonetic system of Qie Yun is aspirated or not. Historical comparative method, as the only way, has its limitations in order to find out their actual pronunciation, the study of Sanskrit - Chinese transliteration makes up this defect. The fact of Sanskrit - Chinese transliteration tells us： in actual spoken lan- guage, voiced initials in the middle ancient Chinese and the phonetic system of Qie Yun does have two kinds of pro- nunciation： aspiration and not aspiration, besides, they don＇t any function of differentiation of meaning. Moreover, this characteristic still retains in today＇s Wu dialect, which belongs to a historical problem of phonetic develop- ment.