清末编订名词馆的历史考察

A Historical Review on Terms Compiling Department of Late Qing Dynasty

编订名词馆是清末设立的,以编纂各学科名词表、统一中外名词译名为主要工作的官方机构。清廷希望通过这一机构,解决甲午战后东、西方新名词涌入中国所导致的译名混乱问题。然而由于清末新政时期的行政紊乱、效率低下,编订名词馆的活动并未达到预想的社会作用。严复等编纂者在选择、创造各学科名词译名时所体现的文化保守主义和反对日本译词的态度,成为名词馆所编名词对照表不被当时社会接受的主因。

Terms compiling department was an official institution founded in late Ch’ing, whose main work was to compile glossaries of terms from different subjects and to unify their translated names. Through this department, Qing Dynasty expected to solve the chaotic problem of different translated names, which result-ed from new terms of both eastern and western countries pouring into China after the first Sino-Japanese war. However, the activities of terms compiling department didn’t realize its expected social impact because of the administrative disorder and inefficiency during the New Deal in late Qing Dynasty. Compilers, such as Yan Fu, embodied their cultural conservatism and anti-Japanese terms attitude while choosing and creating their trans-lated names of terms from different subjects, which became the main reason that glossaries of terms made by terms compiling department didn’t receive enough social acceptance.