Erya

Also known as The Literary Expositor, The Ready Rectifier, Progress Towards Correctness, The Semantic Approximator, Near Correct, Approaching Elegance

The Erya or Erh-ya is the first surviving Chinese dictionary. The sinologist Bernhard Karlgren concluded that "the major part of its glosses must reasonably date from the 3rd century BC."

Key facts

Chinese.s: 尔雅
Chinese.p: Ěryǎ
Chinese.j: Ji5-ngaa5
Chinese.title: Erya
Chinese.pic: Erya Zhushu - Chinese Dictionary Museum.JPG
Chinese.piccap: Erya exhibit at Chinese Dictionary Museum (Jincheng, Shanxi)
Chinese.l: approaching what is correct
Chinese.y: Yíh-ngáah
Chinese.poj: Ní-ngá
Chinese.oc bs: &ast;n[e][r]ʔ N-ɢˤraʔ
Chinese.qn: Nhĩ Nhã
Chinese.chuhan: 爾雅
Chinese.kanji: 爾雅
Chinese.kana: じが
Chinese.romaji: Jiga
Chinese.hangul: 이아
Chinese.hanja: 爾雅
Chinese.rr: Ia

via Wikipedia infobox

Wikidata facts

Image: Erya Zhushu - Chinese Dictionary Museum.JPG

Show 3 more facts

publication date: 0300-00-00
title: 爾雅
Commons category: Erya

Sources (3)

via Wikidata · CC0

~9 min read

Article

8 sections

Contents

Title
History
Content
See also
References
Citations
Sources
External links

The Erya or Erh-ya is the first surviving Chinese dictionary. The sinologist Bernhard Karlgren concluded that "the major part of its glosses must reasonably date from the 3rd century BC."

==Title== Chinese scholars interpret the first title character ěr (; "you, your; adverbial suffix") as a phonetic loan character for the homophonous ěr (; "near; close; approach"), and believe the second yǎ (; "proper; correct; refined; elegant") refers to words or language. According to W. South Coblin: "The interpretation of the title as something like 'approaching what is correct, proper, refined' is now widely accepted". It has been translated as "The Literary Expositor" or "The Ready Rectifier" (both by Legge), "Progress Towards Correctness" (von Rosthorn), "Near Correct" (Xue), "The Semantic Approximator" (Needham), and "Approaching Elegance" (Mair).