“胡说八道”述考

An Etymological Note of the Idiom Hushuo Badao 胡说八道

"胡说八道"是现代汉语中的一个常用成语,其中的数词"八"字作何解,一直没有明确的说法,有学者认为"说不明白"。本文通过对历史文献的考察,结合汉语方言中"八""白"语音情况等的分析,认为"胡说八道"是由"胡说白道"中的"白"为语音相近(在有些方言中相同)的"八"所替代而得。材料显示,"胡说白道"至少在明朝万历年间(16世纪后期)就有成熟的用法,而"胡说八道"的最早用例则始见于清代嘉庆年间(18世纪末、19世纪初)。音同或音近而讹并积非成是的情况在汉语史上不乏其例,这也是有语言的内在原因的。

Hushuo Badao 胡说八道 is a frequently-used idiom in Modern Chinese.However,it is unclear what the numeral ba 八 stands for in this idiom.Based on the investigations of historical documents and the analyses of the pronunciations of ba 八 and bai 白 in Chinese dialects,this paper states that Hushuo Badao 胡说八道 is variated from Hushuo Baidao 胡说白道 by replacing bai 白 with ba八which is proved to be homophonic to bai 白 in some Chinese dialects.Such kind of misuse involved with homophones could often appear in conversations and transcriptions in history.