The theoretical significance of ancient Chinese ethnic writings

Abstract From ancient times to the early twentieth century, nearly 40 distinct ancient writing systems of China’s ethnic minorities coexisted with Chinese characters, forming a richly diverse “garden of scripts.” From the perspective of the general theory of writing systems, this paper examines the relationship between language and mnemonic symbols as exemplified by the Poya Songbook, the Ersu Shaba pictographs, and the Naxi Dongba pictographs. It argues that the evolution from mnemonic symbols to syllabic writing systems inherently involves the process of homophonic borrowing. The antiquity of a writing system should not be evaluated solely based on its appearance or communicative function; rather, greater emphasis should be placed on its connection to fixed speech units. Furthermore, this paper explores how the word-formation methods of these ancient writings have enriched the traditional Chinese theory of Liushu (the “Six Methods” of character formation) and investigates the factors and primary motivations driving an ethnic group’s decision to adopt a script for recording their native language.