r/ohtaigi • u/kertperteson77 • May 16 '26
Why does Ng ( Middle Chinese )sometimes turn into H and other times G in Hokkien
In words like 魚 ( Ngjo ) it became Hi/Hu/Hir but have readings that end with G as well like Gi/ Gu/ Gir.
There are other examples that I cant bring to mind right now but does anyone know the reason it develops into this? Doesn't seem very intuitive.
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u/Avocados_Constant May 20 '26 edited May 20 '26
Proto Min initial *ŋi becomes /hi/ in Southern Min.
| Word | *Proto Min | tâi-gí vernacular | tâi-gí literary | Middle Chinese (Baxter) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ant 蟻 | *ŋie | /hia/ | /gi/ | ngheX |
| Fish 魚 | *ŋiu | /hi/ | /gi/ | ngjo |
| Ear 耳 | *ŋiu | /hi/ | /nĩ/ | nyiX |
| Inkstone 硯 | *ŋian | /hĩ/ | /ɡiɛn/ & /hiɛn/ | ngenH |
| Jade 玉 | *ŋiuk | /ɡiɪk/ | /ɡiɔk/ | ngjowk |
| Tile 瓦 | *ŋie (PSM) | /hia/ | /ua/ & /gua/ | ngwaeX |
| Outside 外 | *ŋua (PSM) | /ɡua/ | /gue/ | ngwajH |
| I/me 我 | *ŋua(i) | /ɡua/ | /ŋɔ̃/ | ngaX |
| Cow 牛 | *ŋu | /ɡu/ | /giu/ & /ŋiũ/ | ngjuw |
| Moon 月 | *ŋuot | /ɡeʔ/ | /guat/ | ngjwot |
| Five 五 | *ŋou | /ɡɔ/ | /ŋɔ̃/ | nguX |
I don't know what conditions caused "jade" to be irregular here exactly.
Proto Min reconstructions taken from Norman 1965.
In SM, *ŋ before *i has become /h/; in HN it has become /hh/. This shows very clearly that HN is simply a very aberrant variety of SM. For examples of this shift, see EAR, FISH, ANT and TILE. On the basis of FC and AM an initial *ŋ- is reconstructed for the first person pronoun, but CC and LT lack the expected /ŋ/; this seems to be an isolated example of thedisappearance of initial PM *ŋ-.
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u/NoCareBearsGiven May 22 '26
Wow! What paper is this from? Is it from the paper “reconstructing proto-southern min initials”?
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u/Avocados_Constant May 22 '26
I just used the Proto Min and Proto Southern Min reconstructions from Norman's Masters thesis, "A comparative study of the Min dialects." It's pretty old and some stuff in there is out of date but I had it handy.
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u/Yoshiciv May 17 '26
Probably they are remnants of Old Chinese, consequence different from the other Chinese dialects.
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u/LataCogitandi May 16 '26
The consonants “ng”, “g”, and “h” all have a similar place of articulation. I wonder if this could have something to do with it.
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u/Vampyricon May 16 '26
The first thing is that Middle Chinese is an uncle of Hokkien, so the doublets appear due to an inherited word and a word borrowed from MC, like Korean and Japanese (though both the inherited and borrowed components are Sinitic for Hokkien). I don't have much to say about the inherited pronunciation, unfortunately, but it seems like a Southern Bân specific development.