A couple of students came to the office to demonstrate their Manchu skills.  Mrs Guan was given the third book I mentioned in the last post (which you can open up and look at to follow along, if you like), so she could say some words in Chinese and have the students say their Manchu equivalents. 

She picked a word from the first page of the book, ten thousand (#13 in the lower right hand corner: 一万, yīwàn), and the students quickly reply:

emu tumen (note that I’m not using the book’s crazy romanization)

No problem there.  Next she asks the word for one hundred million (#14: 一亿, yīyì).  The students stumble for a second, and get it wrong saying emu minggan.  One of the students quickly realizes their mistake, and says that’s the word for one thousand, and then they quickly correct it.

emu bunai

We can see clearly here that the student’s native language is Mandarin, because as soon as the student realizes the mistake, he shouts out a very short “buh!”, which is a typical way any Chinese child would pronounce 不 (bù) in that kind of a situation.

The next exchange between Shi Junguang (SJG), Mrs Guan (MG), and the students (SS), is interesting from a sociolinguistic point of view:

Quick translation:

SJG: (pointing to a page in the book) You can also ask them any of these.  They might have forgotten some of them; it’s been a long time,  Some of….

MG: (completely ignoring SJG, addressing someone else) Then take a picture of us!

SJG: (not sure how to deal with this)…after a while…one year…

MG: (getting louder) Of ME!  WITH THESE TWO KIDS!

SJG: …after one year…

Other person: We could video it.

SJG: These two have a lot of…

MG: HEY! HOW DO YOU SAY “ANSWER THE QUESTION”? “ANSWER THE QUESTION”?

SJG: …afterwards…

MG: HOW DO YOU SAY “HEAD”?  “Head”?

Student 1: “Head”?

MG: “Head”.

Student 1: hoto.

Student 2: hoto.

MG: “Head”?

Student 1: (softly, as if in disbelief) hoto.

SJG: They said it; hoto.  Say it louder.

SS: HOTO!

MG: How do you say “head”?

Student 1: hoto.

Student 2: hoto.

Aside from the asker’s center-of-attention-grabbing interruptions (who is supposed to be shown off here, anyway?), and the pure surreality of the “conversation” in general, note their pronunciation of hoto, which is very obviously influenced by Chinese.  It sounds exactly like pinyin huōtuo.  The Manchu sound should be more of a pure [o] or [ɔ], and not the Chinese [uo].

The next couple of words trip the students up:

Mrs Guan asks the words for nose (鼻子, bízi) and tongue (舌头, shétou), and after the students look around and scratch their heads, Shi Junguang says they forgot, and then gives the words.  Nose is oforo, which he pronounces as owulo (using normal Manchu romanization), and tongue is ilenggu, which according to Materials of Spoken Manchu, is usually spoken in Sanjiazi as yulong (using normal Manchu romanization), but he pronounces it the same as Chinese pinyin yulun, just like it is written in the book Mrs Guan is reading from.

Next she interrupts to ask “teacher” (老师, lǎoshī), and “study” (学习, xuéxí); and then “hello teacher” (老师好, lǎoshīhǎo) and “hello guest” (客人好, kèrénhǎo).

Teacher is sefu, which is taken from Chinese 师傅 (shīfu, master).  In the book Mrs Guan is reading from, it is given as sewo, but the student seems to say something like owo.  Study is tacimbi, (the students forgot it at first, but Shi Junguang corrects them) but in the book it is tacime.  This is very odd.  Verbs in the book are given in their -me form, which while similar to the English infinitive, is not the way that verbs are normally listed in Manchu dictionaries.  They are normally listed with a -mbi ending, which corresponds basically with simple present.  The -me form is used for verbs that are not the main verb in the sentence, so they cannot be used alone.

“Hello teacher” is sefu sain (sewo sain), and “hello guest” is antaha sain.  This construction, X sain, seems to be a translation of Chinese X 好, as in 你好, which was popularized in China in the 1980s.  The staff here at Echoes of Manchu has not yet been able to find any verifiable Qing dynasty examples of Manchu X sain as a greeting, but there may be some Chinese examples of X 好.  Sima is currently preparing a post on that topic.

Next, Mrs Guan asks the word for everybody (大家, dàjiā), and following a long pause, I ask the word for student.

For “everybody”, the students say saza, which is what is written in the book, but I can’t find anything resembling that in any dictionaries.  The closest thing I can find is in Materials of Spoken Manchu, which gives “crowd” in a phonetic spelling as sasəxəčjə (I’d have to take a wild guess at how to romanize that).  Also, Enenggi gives an adverb sasa, which means “together”.

“Student” is given as xaiwe (it’s given in Materials of Spoken Manchu that way also).  In traditional Manchu it’s xabi.  Perhaps it was changed on account of its sounding very much like a common Chinese putdown, shǎbī (silly twat), which I’m sure all of the students are familiar with.  In fact, I wonder if there might really be a relationship between those two words, because according to Gertraude Roth Li (p351, #5), self-deprecation was used in Manchu to show humility.

Next, Shi Junguang takes the bull by the horns and shows us the grand finale: letting the students translate some sentences!

SJG: 上节课我们学到哪了? (How far did we get in the last class?)

SS: fujinmu kicen musei ya de … … tacime inaha.

(Traditional Manchu: ???? kicen musei yabade tacime isinaha.)

???? [previous]
kicen [lesson]
musei [we]
yabade [to what place]
tacime [study]
isinaha. [arrived]

SJG: 学到第三课了. ((We) got to the third lesson.)

SS: ilan kicen gisureme inaha.

(Traditional Manchu: ilan kicen gisureme isinaha.)

ilan [three]
kicen [lesson]
gisureme [discuss]
isinaha. [arrived]

SJG: 我读一句儿. (I’ll read a sentence).

SS: bi emu gisun hvlame.

(Traditional Manchu: bi emu gisun hulambi.)

bi [I]
emu [one]
gisun [sentence]
hvlambi. [read aloud]

SJG: 大家跟我读一句儿. (Everybody read a sentence with me.)

SS: saza mimbe dageme emu gisun hvla.

(Traditional Manchu: ???? mimbe dahame emu gisun hvla.)

???? [everybody]
mimbe [with me]
dahame [follow]
emu [one]
gisun [sentence]
hvla [read aloud]

They obviously spend some time developing fluency, huh?

yacin niman jai xayan niman

emu xayan niman jai yacin niman tuhan be  dulerede, ishunde jugvn anahvnjarakv temxembi. xayan niman gisureme, oi, yacin niman, si goro tuci, bi neneme dulembi serede, yacin  niman gisureme, oi, xayan niman, si dohorome yabu, bi neneme dulembi sehe. juwe niman xukilarade gemu bira ci tuheke.

———

yacin [black]
niman [goat]
jai [and ]
xayan niman [white goat]

The black goat and the white goat.

—–emu [one]
—–xayan niman [white goat]
—–jai [and]
—–yacin niman [black goat]
—–tuhan [single-log bridge]
—–be [direct object marker]
—–dulerede, [dulere = crossing; de = when]
ishunde [each other]
jugvn [way, path]
anahvnjarakv [not yielding]
temxembi. [fight]

When a white goat and a black goat were crossing a single log bridge, they were arguing, not letting each other pass.

—–xayan niman [white goat]
—–gisureme, [say]
—–—–oi, [hey]
—–—–yacin niman, [black goat]
—–—–si [you]
—–—–goro [far]
—–—–tuci, [get out] 1
—–—–bi [I]
—–—–neneme [first]
—–—–dulembi [pass]
—–serede, [saying]
yacin niman [black goat]
gisureme, [say]
—–oi, [hey]
—–xayan niman, [white goat]
—–si [you]
—–dohorome [scram] 2
—–yabu, [go]
—–bi [I]
—–neneme [first]
—–dulembi [cross]
sehe. [said]

When the white goat said “hey, black goat, you get out of here! I’m crossing first”, the black goat said “hey, white goat, you scram! I’m crossing first.”

1. Möllendorff says that tucimbi (get out) is irregular and the imperative form is tucinu.  The form tuci seems to be a regularized version.
2. dohorome is not listed in Enenggi, but Anaku gives it as 滚开 (gǔnkāi, get out).  The Chinese expression is impolite, which may explain its noninclusion in Enenggi.

—–juwe [two]
—–niman [goats]
—–xukilarade [xukilara = butt horns; de = when]
gemu [both]
bira [river]
ci [from] 3
tuheke. [fell]

While the two goats were butting horns, they fell into the river.

3. This can be nothing other than a mistake.  The Chinese translation given for bira ci tuheke is 掉到河里去了 (diào dào hé li qù le, fell into the river).  bira ci tuheke would be fell from the river.  So the correct version of the Manchu must be bira de tuheke.

[Note: see comments below.]

Gertraude Roth Li’s (GRL) book, Manchu: a textbook for reading documents (MTRD), is excellent, but it does not purport to be a grammar textbook.  It is designed primarily to help historians to be able to read Manchu documents, so although it is permeated with wonderful grammatical notes, it (deliberately) doesn’t explore syntax in a very complete way.

So exploring the texts in Möllendorff may be a good foothold and introduction to Manchu grammar.  In this series of posts, I will go through the texts in Möllendorff and explain the grammar in light of all the resources I have at my disposal, and provide a fresh translation.  I warmly welcome comments and corrections from readers.

The “analyzed texts” in Möllendorff are based on the first ten lessons in The Hundred Lessons in Sir Thomas Wade’s 自迩集 (zì’ěrjí).  Apparently, it was originally written in Chinese for Wade’s book (but most likely not by Wade), and Möllendorff had it translated into Manchu for his book (he doesn’t say explicitly that he didn’t translate it himself, but I’d be very surprised if he did).  Or perhaps it was originally written in both Chinese and Manchu for the purpose of learning either language.  Möllendorff used Wade’s English translation of the Chinese, which I think doesn’t always suit the Manchu rendering; also Wade’s English is very dated.  The reading is divided into ten sections.  We’ll look at one section at a time, paying special attention to the grammar.  Manchu is a head-final language, so the subject comes first, and then the object (often marked with be) and the verb comes last.  It is also heavily inflected.

There is a context to the readings.  A younger guy (hereafter YG) stops at an older guy’s (OG) house and mentions that he’s studying Manchu.  This develops into an ongoing discussion over several meetings.

OG: donjici si te manju bithe tacimbi sembi.

(donjici … sembi appears to be structured this way:)

donjici [(I)  hear]
—si [you]
—te [now]
—manju bithe [Manchu language]
—tacimbi [learn]
sembi

I hear you’re studying Manchu now.

In MTRD, GRL says (p43):  ”Quotes are usually introduced by coordinative converbs derived from a verb of speaking and they end with a finite form of another verb of speaking.”  Later (p91) she mentions a structure: “Direct and indirect speech with -ci + (sehe, donjiha, etc.).”  In the examples she cites, one could look at these as quotations, but to me they seem to fall under the bigger umbrella of subordinate clauses.  In English, subordinate clauses are like this: “He said (that) he would go.”  The main clause is “he said X”, and the subordinate clause is X.  These kinds of subordinate clauses, called content clauses, are usually a complement of a cognitive verb, like think or say.  donjimbi (hear) is one of these verbs.  (I can’t help thinking that it’s kind of mean to start the student out on such a complex structure.)

umesi sain. [very good]

Very good!

manju gisun serengge. musei manjusai ujui uju oyonggo baita.

manju gisun [Manchu language]
serengge. [as for (emphasis)]
musei [our]
manjusai [Manchu peoples']
ujui uju oyonggo baita.  [most important thing]

The Manchu language is the most important thing for Manchu people.

No verb here, but still a recognizable subject + predicate.  -i is the genitive ending.

uthai nikasai meni meni gisun i adali.

uthai [therefore]
nikasai [Chinese people's]
meni meni ba i [of everywhere]
gisun i [to the language]
adali. [similar]

So it is similar to the language of Chinese people everywhere.

The point here seems to be that the Manchu language being important to Manchu people is similar to the way that the Chinese language is important to Chinese people.

bahanarakvci ombio.

bahanarakvci [if (you) can't do it]
ombio. [Is that OK?]

Would not being able to speak it be OK?

-o is an interrogative ending.

YG: inu waka oci ai.

inu [indeed]
waka [not]
oci [if be]
ai. [what?]

Indeed, if not, what then?

bi juwan aniya funceme nikan bithe taciha.

bi [I]
juwan aniya [ten years]
funceme [in excess of]
nikan bithe [Chinese language]
taciha. [have studied]

I’ve studied Chinese for over ten years.

tetele umai dube da tucirakv.

tetele [te = now, tele = up to; up to now]
umai [not at all]
dube da [dube = the extreme end, da = beginning; at the very beginning]
tucirakv. [does not appear]

It still seems like I’m at the very beginning.

This sentence incorporates a double negative.  Möllendorff, p12, says that “a double negation often occurs”.  The two negatives cancel each other out.

jai aikabade manju bithe hvlarakv. ubaliyambure be tacirakv oci. juwe de gemu sartabure de isinambi.

jai [furthermore]
aikabade [if]
—manju bithe [Manchu language]
—hvlarakv. [(I) don't study]
—ubaliyambure [translating]
—be [accusative particle]
—tacirakv [(I) don't learn]
oci. [cond. of be]
juwe de [in the two]
gemu [both]
sartabure de [to procrastinating]
isinambi. [arrive at]

And if I don’t study Manchu and learn how to translate, I’ll just be putting both of them off.

I’m not completely sure about the aikabade … oci structure.  In fact I just made it up.  But it seems logical.  [Update: I have now somehow procured Gorelova's book (which is extremely useful, despite it's horrible typography), and on p355, it describes this structure.  A conditional conjunction and a verb with a conditional inflection together act as delimiters around the conditional clause.  In this example, aikabade is the conjunction, and oci is the verb with conditional inflection.  These two words surround the two parallel clauses manju bithe hvlarakv. ubaliyambure be tacirakv.]

uttu ofi. emude oci. age be tuwanjiha.

uttu ofi. [having been this way]
emude [in the first place]
oci. [as for]
age [older brother]
be [accusative particle]
tuwanjiha. [came and visited]

Being like this, first of all, I came to visit you.

jai de oci. geli sakda ahvn de baire babi.

jai de [in the second place]
oci. [as for]
geli [also]
sakda ahvn de [to older brother]
baire [requesting]
babi. [ba = occasion, bi = there is]

Second of all, I have a chance to ask you for something.

damu baibi angga juwara de mangga.

damu [but]
baibi [simply]
angga [mouth]
juwara de [in opening]
mangga. [difficult]

But it’s difficult just to open my mouth.

OG:  ede aibi.

ede aibi. [So what?]

So what?

gisun bici. uthai gisure.

gisun [words]
bici. [if there are]
uthai [then]
gisure [speak]

If you have something to say, then say it!

mini mutere baita oci. sinde bi geli marimbio.

mini [my]
mutere [being able]
baita [a matter]
oci. [if is]
sinde [to you]
bi [I]
geli [also]
marimbio. [turn away?]

If my ability is anything, would I turn away from you?

YG: mini bairengge. age gosici. xadambi seme ainara.

mini bairengge. [my request:]
age [older brother]
gosici. [if care]
xadambi [get tired]
seme [no matter whether]
ainara. [will do what]

My request is this:  if you care about me, that you will do what’s necessary, even if it’s troublesome.

xolo xolo de. udu meyen manju gisun banjibufi. minde hvlabureo.

xolo xolo de. [in spare time]
udu [a few]
meyen [paragraph]
manju gisun [Manchu language]
banjibufi. [having produced]
minde [for me]
hvlabureo. [please cause to study]

Please write some Manchu paragraphs in your spare time for me to study.

deo bi bahafi hvwaxaci. gemu age i kesi kai. ainaha seme baili be onggorakv. urunakv ujeleme karulaki.

deo bi [Little brother I]
bahafi [having gotten]
hvwaxaci. [if develop]
gemu [all]
age i [older brother's]
kesi [kindness]
kai. [particle of emphasis]

If I progress, it will be all because of your kindness.

deo bi is an interesting construction.  In Chinese you can’t say 弟弟我, but rather either 弟弟 or 我.  Nor in English can you modify pronouns, but you could say “I, your little brother”.

ainaha seme baili be onggorakv.

ainaha seme [surely]
baili be [kindness]
onggorakv. [won't forget]

I certainly won’t forget your kindness.

urunakv ujeleme karulaki.

urunakv [must]
ujeleme [generously]
karulaki. [may I repay]

I must repay you generously.

GRL told me that the coordinative converb ending -me could often be thought of as working like the English -ly ending.

OG: ainu uttu gisurembi.

ainu [why]
uttu [this way]
gisurembi. [say]

Why do you say it like that?

si aika gurun gvwao damu sini tacirakv be hedumbi dere

si [you]
aika [if]
gurun gvwao. [a foreigner?]

Are you a foreigner?

Manchu has sarcasm!

damu [but]
sini [your]
tacirakv be [not learning]
hendumbi [to say]
dere. [(sentence particle expressing doubt)]

But to say you wouldn’t learn!

There is no punctuation mark in the Möllendorff.  I’m not sure if that’s an oversight or not.  In the Chinese, in Wade’s 自迩集 (zì’ěrjí), there is a comma after that clause.  If the Manchu shouldn’t have a punctuation mark there, then it would mean that sentence-final particles are acceptable in other than sentence-final places.  But that’s probably not the case.

taciki seci tetendere. bi nekulefi simbe niyalma okini sembikai.

taciki [(you) would learn]
seci [if you say]
tetendere. [since]
bi [I]
nekulefi [having taken advantage of this]
simbe [you (accusative)]
niyalma [a person (implying a successful person)]
okini [would that you become]
sembikai. [(with emphatic particle)]

Since you say you would learn, knowing this, I will will help make you become successful.

karulaki serengge ai gisun.

karulaki [would repay]
serengge [as for (emphasis)]
ai [what]
gisun. [language]

Repay?  What a thing to say!

musei dolo gisureci ombio.

musei dolo [between us]
gisureci [if talk]
ombio. [is that OK?]

Should we talk like that to each other?

YG: tuttu oci. bi hukxehe seme wajirakv.

tuttu [like this]
oci. [if it is]
bi [I]
hukxehe seme [appreciating]
wajirakv. [will not end]

If it’s like this, I’m eternally grateful.

damu hengkixeme baniha bure dabala geli aisere.

damu [but]
hengkixeme [kowtowingly]
baniha [thanks]
bure [will give]
dabala [merely]

But I will only give my great thanks.

geli aisere.

geli [else]
aisere. [will say what?]

What else can I say?

After dressing up and taking pictures, Shi Junguang, the Manchu teacher, brought out the books he uses to teach the children in their Manchu language classes.

They are not professionally published, but rather printed out using a color printer.  I’m not sure who wrote these books, but I suspect they were written by Zhao Jinchun, who was the former Manchu teacher at the elementary school, and who now is the vice commissioner of Fuyu county.

The first book is called Manju gisun tacibure bithe 1 debtelin (Manchu language textbook, volume 1), and covers syllables formed from single vowels, and consonants combined with single vowels, with instructions in Manchu and Chinese.  There is also a section with example words.  There are color pictures throughout.  The whole thing is written by hand.  Click on the picture to go to a web album of the whole book, page by page.

The second book is a simpler version of the same thing:   the same syllables, but no pictures.  It would be ideal for tracing.

The third book is more interesting.  It has a Chinese name, 小学满语教材 (xiǎoxué mǎnyǔ jiàocái, Primary School Manchu Textbook), and a Manchu name, Ajige tacikv manju gisun i tacibure bithe ujui debtelin (Primary School Manchu Textbook, volume 1).

It is filled with lessons covering basic conversation and vocabulary.  But the romanization is bastardized Chinese hanyu pinyin, which of course doesn’t match Manchu pronunciation.  If one were to use this as one’s only guide to Manchu pronunciation, one would lose a lot of clarity, just like one would if one used Chinese hanyu pinyin to represent English sounds.  Luckily Shi Junguang’s Manchu pronunciation is pretty good, having learned Manchu from his grandmother, one of the last surviving native speakers.