Classical Chinese Pronunciation?

My post might have been misinterpreted. I was writing in response to the idea of using Baxter-Sagart for romanization instead of pinyin. I did not mean to say that historical reconstruction of Chinese languages was unnecessary. Language is of course instrumental to human existence, and the study of language is of course important to the study of history. However, I see absolutely no need for replacing pinyin with historical reconstructions just because a timeline is set in ancient China. Pinyin is widely recognized and understood, and using pinyin would save an expert reader from wasting time trying to remember reconstructions. It also assists an introductory reader who does not know Chinese characters and who might want to look up a name using pinyin. If reconstructions are used without the corresponding Chinese characters (the way this forum often omits Chinese characters in posts), things get even more confusing.

I seem to have been misinterpreted as well. You go into a lot of depth, but the one area you don't seem to cover very specifically is the one I was referring to - the one in the OP. The question was not about a Chinese POD or WI about Chinese history, but about long-term Chinese knock-ons of an earlier POD. Perhaps I read too much into it, assuming that in such a narrative historical figures would disappear early on.

If it's not a year-event style timeline, writing contact scenarios would be nonsense if written using pinyin, since the pinyin equivalents would almost certainly be divergent from OTL. Those few that would be exceptions could easily be handled by footnotes.

I apologize. You the clearly spent a fair amount of effort defeating the fellow you thought you were arguing with - the man arguing with a straight face that all ancient PODs, What Ifs, or discussion threads should be written in whatever the contemporary language of the period and region might have been. If I'd said something like "in this kind of timeline" perhaps I could have saved you the trouble of arguing against a strawman.

In my defense, I thought it was slightly obvious that I wasn't advocating all discussion of ancient China take place in an extinct language. And the comments of mine you clipped out of your reply might have hinted at what my broader meaning was.

lol

I'll return to the latter parts of your post, where we do have some actual philosophical differences. I'm afraid my afternoon is a bit full.
 
My post might have been misinterpreted. I was writing in response to the idea of using Baxter-Sagart for romanization instead of pinyin. I did not mean to say that historical reconstruction of Chinese languages was unnecessary. Language is of course instrumental to human existence, and the study of language is of course important to the study of history. However, I see absolutely no need for replacing pinyin with historical reconstructions just because a timeline is set in ancient China. Pinyin is widely recognized and understood, and using pinyin would save an expert reader from wasting time trying to remember reconstructions. It also assists an introductory reader who does not know Chinese characters and who might want to look up a name using pinyin. If reconstructions are used without the corresponding Chinese characters (the way this forum often omits Chinese characters in posts), things get even more confusing.

Let's compare a few sample sentences:

(1) "What if Dzaw TshawH won the battle of Tsyhekpek over Swon Gjwen and Ljuw BijH?"

(2) "What if Dzaw TshawH (曹操) won the battle of Tsyhekpek (赤壁) over Swon Gjwen (孫權) and Ljuw BijH (劉備)?"

(3) "What if Cao Cao (曹操) won the battle of Chibi (赤壁) over Sun Quan (孫權) and Liu Bei (劉備)?"

(4) "What if Cao Cao won the battle of Chibi over Sun Quan and Liu Bei?"

If you knew the meaning of the first one without looking up a Middle Chinese reconstruction table, then congratulations. You are a historical reconstruction savant. For the rest of us human beings, (1) makes no sense. A reader trying to make sense of (1) will need to search a reconstruction table to understand what character the syllables TsawH or Pek or BijH correspond to. (2) is understandable only thanks to the Chinese characters, and discussion is impeded because every time the reader re-encounters Ljuw or Swon they need to remember who the reconstructions refer to. In practice, context might make it easier to read even a sentence like (1). A response to (1) like "If Dzaw won at Tsyekpek, the alliance between Swon and Ljuw falls apart. Dzaw might be able to dethrone the ruling dynasty and install himself as Emperor instead of remaining the puppet ruler, and Swon and Ljuw are unlikely to declare themselves Emperor" might be understandable to somebody who already knows Chinese history, and can guess that Dzaw refers to Cao Cao, Swon to Sun Quan, and Ljuw to Liu Bei. But it's a mental leap that is completely unnecessary if pinyin is used right off the bat.

And what, besides satisfying personal preference, does (2) add over (3)? And for popular topics, does (3) even add anything important over (4)? My answer to both of these questions is the same: it doesn't add anything. It just confuses the reader. A sentence like (3) might be necessary for obscure topics, but in general, given how the forum usually delve too deep into obscure Chinese figures and only sticks to the big names, a sentence would seldom need to be more complicated than (4).

Why do I make such a big deal about this? It's because I'd hope to avoid authors using obscure terminology to feign understanding. If a reader wants to write about Dzaw TshawH, he or she can go ahead. If the author wants to use Sō Sō (Japanese) or Jo Jo (Revised Romanization of Korean), there's no technical obstacle either. But using all sorts of different romanizations confuses readers while adding little or nothing to the reader's understanding of the situation.

A reader's comprehension should be more important than the author's preference.

You can use annotations:pensive: I think it's very good to be historically correct.

For example, a Roman hears of the Battle of the Red Cliff. How will he call Cao Cao? Dsa Tsa or Zao Zao?

Obviously Dsa Tsa, because it's closer to the Chinese pronunciation at this time.

Another example. The Roman called China Sinae. Why? Because of the old Chinese pronunciation of Qin. Qin is Pinyin, and guess what? Before I heard of the evolution of Chinese language, I never understood how "Qin" became "Sinae" - now I know that "Qin" was something like "Sin" or "Dzin" in classical Chinese, and it makes sense.
 
Let's compare a few sample sentences:

(1) "What if Dzaw TshawH won the battle of Tsyhekpek over Swon Gjwen and Ljuw BijH?"

(2) "What if Dzaw TshawH (曹操) won the battle of Tsyhekpek (赤壁) over Swon Gjwen (孫權) and Ljuw BijH (劉備)?"

(3) "What if Cao Cao (曹操) won the battle of Chibi (赤壁) over Sun Quan (孫權) and Liu Bei (劉備)?"

(4) "What if Cao Cao won the battle of Chibi over Sun Quan and Liu Bei?"

If you knew the meaning of the first one without looking up a Middle Chinese reconstruction table, then congratulations. You are a historical reconstruction savant. For the rest of us human beings, (1) makes no sense. A reader trying to make sense of (1) will need to search a reconstruction table to understand what character the syllables TsawH or Pek or BijH correspond to. (2) is understandable only thanks to the Chinese characters, and discussion is impeded because every time the reader re-encounters Ljuw or Swon they need to remember who the reconstructions refer to. In practice, context might make it easier to read even a sentence like (1). A response to (1) like "If Dzaw won at Tsyekpek, the alliance between Swon and Ljuw falls apart. Dzaw might be able to dethrone the ruling dynasty and install himself as Emperor instead of remaining the puppet ruler, and Swon and Ljuw are unlikely to declare themselves Emperor" might be understandable to somebody who already knows Chinese history, and can guess that Dzaw refers to Cao Cao, Swon to Sun Quan, and Ljuw to Liu Bei. But it's a mental leap that is completely unnecessary if pinyin is used right off the bat.

And what, besides satisfying personal preference, does (2) add over (3)? And for popular topics, does (3) even add anything important over (4)? My answer to both of these questions is the same: it doesn't add anything. It just confuses the reader. A sentence like (3) might be necessary for obscure topics, but in general, given how the forum usually delve too deep into obscure Chinese figures and only sticks to the big names, a sentence would seldom need to be more complicated than (4).

G.W_FY already touched on most of my points. Suffice it to say, the scenarios above do not disagree with any of my arguments. Indeed, if someone had actually argued what you thought I did, I would probably have written something similar to your post myself.

Mine wouldn't have included your great examples though. What was your source, if I may?

Since it disappeared from your response, and there is some distinction from G.W_FY's points, I'll restate the most apropos of my previous examples of times and places that this kind of classical language could add value:

But I could think of a lot of contexts where it would work very well.... A show like Vikings could showcase a historical dialect on first introducing it, or when showing the perspective of outsiders (they had the Anglo-Saxons speaking Old English when the Norse characters needed a translator, the Vikings speaking bits in Best Guess Old Norwegian when Anglo-Saxons needed not to understand).

I hope that's more clear for you now.

Why do I make such a big deal about this? It's because I'd hope to avoid authors using obscure terminology to feign understanding. If a reader wants to write about Dzaw TshawH, he or she can go ahead. If the author wants to use Sō Sō (Japanese) or Jo Jo (Revised Romanization of Korean), there's no technical obstacle either. But using all sorts of different romanizations confuses readers while adding little or nothing to the reader's understanding of the situation.

A reader's comprehension should be more important than the author's preference.

"Feign understanding" I have to take issue with. That's purely you projecting your assumptions onto others, who are as or more likely to be motivated by mild obsession to detail or the desire to accurately reflect what contemporary foreigners would hear when a famous place, person, or dynasty was referred to in that era. If, of course, someone someday actually used the ancient Chinese romanisation in the absurdist What Ifs you depict, sure - at that point the person is clearly just putting on airs.

But that is a change of subject originating from you, not from the people you are disagreeing with, and not from the OP. The people in the room are talking about something else entirely.

I won't pick at the Japanese idea, or the focus on technical obstacles. Between my posts and G.Washington_Effyeah's I think it's pretty clear what can potentially be added to the reader's understanding of the situation, and the contexts in which that addition would be valuable.
 
Vixagoras stated earlier "This does mean however that the romanized orthography of Chinese names in my timeline is going to look... weird"

If that's not a statement that OP intends to use reconstructions of Old/Middle Chinese for Chinese names in lieu of pinyin, then what is it saying, exactly? Looking closer, I guess there is the possibility that an author is talking about creating an alternate phonology based off of reconstructions. In that case, the author might think something like "周 was Tsyuw in Middle Chinese, and 朱 was Tsyu in Middle Chinese, so in my timeline in ATL 1900, both will collapse to the pronunciation Zsyu, which I just invented." In that case, I throw up my hands and concede that a timeline's romanization will be different and there's nothing I can do about it. In that case, I might read a statement like "By ATL 1900, the Lrjang Dynasty founded by Hwieng Myexng set up their capital at Krjam-tso"* and I would admit there is less or no justification for using pinyin. Such a situation should still use Chinese characters though. *I made up those pronunciations but the Chinese characters would have been 梁, 王明, and 甘州 in that order)

But I think it's more likely, from this statement and unless Vixagoras cares to elaborate, that reconstructions will be used for romanization of Chinese names, where that timeline discusses Chinese figures who spoke Old Chinese. I don't see how what I wrote was therefore a strawman. The OP explained that he or she wanted to use reconstructions for orthography. You and others then suggested that the reconstructions would be helpful in other situations such as using reconstructions to understand how Old Chinese once sounded, or to use it in contact timelines, or other sorts of timelines. (I also believe, but can't say for certain, that Zmflavius' opposition to a name like "Zlu Mrans-twg" came in the romanized orthography context as opposed to the Rome:HBO context.) In my post, I only addressed using reconstructions for romanization. I think I've remained fairly on-track in my own discussion.
 
Well, considering Old Chinese was more closer to Tibeto-Burman languages than the modern Chinese regionalects - we actually have a similar problem with Tibetan. The Wylie Romanization currently used for the language basically reproduces the written language, which itself is representative (I think) of Old Tibetan. Obviously a lot has changed between the modern Tibetan varieties and Old Tibetan, but when it comes to Romanizing names we have a problem. For example, take the official name of the Autonomous Region, which in Tibetan script is written <བོད་རང་སྐྱོང་ལྗོངས།>. Do you Romanize it as <bod rang skyong ljongs> (following Wylie) or do you Romanize it as <Poi Ranggyong Jong> (following the official Pinyin scheme for Tibetan)? With Burmese (another Tibeto-Burman language) we're on more firmer ground since the orthography is more recent (and we can compare it with other languages which borrowed vocabulary, such as Thai). So for Sino-Tibetan languages in general, this is an area that requires close examination, particularly for those that have a written form.
 
But I think it's more likely, from this statement and unless Vixagoras cares to elaborate, that reconstructions will be used for romanization of Chinese names, where that timeline discusses Chinese figures who spoke Old Chinese. I don't see how what I wrote was therefore a strawman. The OP explained that he or she wanted to use reconstructions for orthography. You and others then suggested that the reconstructions would be helpful in other situations such as using reconstructions to understand how Old Chinese once sounded, or to use it in contact timelines, or other sorts of timelines. (I also believe, but can't say for certain, that Zmflavius' opposition to a name like "Zlu Mrans-twg" came in the romanized orthography context as opposed to the Rome:HBO context.) In my post, I only addressed using reconstructions for romanization. I think I've remained fairly on-track in my own discussion.

To clarify, it's both. Such a romanization would be both inaccurate historically (both because of limitations in what is possible in historical reconstruction and because of necessary simplifications for readability) and entirely non-informative/unclear for basically any audience.
 
I don't know about others, but personally I find it quite interesting to see how pronunciation has changed. Maybe as a compromise, you could use the modern Romanisations, and add the Old Chinese version in brackets the first time the name is mentioned.
 
Vixagoras stated earlier "This does mean however that the romanized orthography of Chinese names in my timeline is going to look... weird"

If that's not a statement that OP intends to use reconstructions of Old/Middle Chinese for Chinese names in lieu of pinyin, then what is it saying, exactly?

I'm honestly not sure whether to reply in full, or how. The above strongly suggests you're either being deliberately obtuse or just can't understand me. I don't mean this to be hostile.... I'm just scratching my head, at a loss how this could be an intellectually honest response.

You're arguing against a point no one is making. Again.

I was not making the point that the OP did not intend to use reconstructions of Old/Middle Chinese for Chinese names in lieu of pinyin. If you look through my past posts carefully, that will be quite clear. As such, I have no answer to the question above.

The OP, my posts, and a couple other posters were discussing using reconstructions and - when it was questioned - the ways in which they could add value. You changed the subject to posing What If questions and having discussions of alternate history in dead languages, which you and I agree would not make sense. I pointed out that the issue for myself and the OP was use of the reconstructions in narrative contexts, not in anything like the examples you provided for why it wouldn't make sense. Then your response is to ask the question above.... Which has no useful answer because it's asking a question you and I agree on.

What is going on?
 
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