《左传》与《论衡》“之”字用法比较

Usage Comparison of the usage of 之(zhi) in Zuo Zhuan and Lun Heng

先秦典籍《左传》和东汉王充《论衡》中涉及到大量的"之"字,用法上主要包括动词、代词、助词三种。文章比较了两部作品中的"之"字用法,发现"之"字动词用法数量最少,从《左传》到《论衡》,"之"字动词用法数量总体呈现递减趋势,代词用法数量不断减少,助词用法数量不断增加。这种差异基本上符合实词虚化的演变规律,文章进一步分析了这种差异各自产生的原因。

The character 之(zhi) frequents both classics, Zuo Zhuan of Pre-Qin period and Lun Heng by Wang Chong of Eastern Han Dynasty, and grammatically, it falls into three categories, verb, pronoun, and auxiliary verb. This paper makes a diachronic comparison of its usage between the two books, and finds that a) it is least used as a verb, more in Zuo Zhuan than Lun Heng;b) so is its use as a pronoun, in contrast, c) it is used more as an auxiliary verb in the latter than the former. Such differences parallel notional words’ grammaticalization in their evolution. The paper then analyzes underlying causes to these transformations.