Re: Optimum number of symbols

Raymond Brown scripsit:

> I suppose it is 'trivially easy' to sit down for a quarter of an hour or so
> and come up with an alphabeticization for Mandarin Chinese (I've done so
> many times  :)
> But it is not, I submit, a trivial task to come up with a satisfactory form
> of Romanization.  There have been so far four centuries of attempts.
But I don't think the difficulties of Romanization particularly reflect
the difficulties of alphabeticization.  The former arise because Latin
script has been around for millennia and has built up a substantial
tradition of its own.

> 1918 saw the publication of the Zhu4yin1 Zi4mu3 (Pronunciation Alphabet) in
> which the symbols were adapted from forms of simple characters;this was
> introduced into schools in 1920.
And this scheme was put together in a few years and has endured up to
this day, being used in elementary writing in Taiwan still, and being
acceptable (as no other orthography is, whether hanzi or Latin)
to all the different Chinese-speaking nations.  Alphabetizing Chinese
was in fact very straightforward, being based on an analysis of
Chinese syllables into initials and rhymes that dates back to
the Tang Dynasty.

--
John Cowan <jcowan@...>     http://www.reutershealth.com
I amar prestar aen, han mathon ne nen,    http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
han mathon ne chae, a han noston ne 'wilith.  --Galadriel, _LOTR:FOTR_

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