Talk:琿

Pronunciations

@RcAlex36, Suzukaze-c Hey! In this edit: [1] Àihuī is removed for Àihún. Both seem legitimate[2]: 现代汉语词典7 p578, column 2: "珲（琿）huī 瑷珲（Àihuī），地名，在黑龙江。" & "字詞 【璦琿縣】注音 ㄞˋ ㄏㄨㄣˊ ㄒㄧㄢˋ漢語拼音 ài hún xiàn" [3]. Now, how should Pronunciation 1 be written on this page? Should hún ㄏㄨㄣˊ be added to Pronunciation 1, or should 璦琿 appear in the Compounds sections for both Pronunciation 1 and Pronunciation 2? Thanks for your time. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 08:06, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

1. Oof, thanks for catching that.
2. No opinion, honestly. —Suzukaze-c (talk) 08:22, 2 April 2021 (UTC)

Definitions

@RcAlex36 In a 2018 edit, I added 'beautiful jade' for both Mandarin pronunciations, ㄏㄨㄟ and ㄏㄨㄣˊ. That edit was partially undone in this 2021 edit where the 'beautiful jade' definition was removed from ㄏㄨㄟ and it was asserted that "That belongs to pronunciation 2" (namely ㄏㄨㄣˊ), which seems consistent with Jiyun, Cihai 6 and maybe a more traditionalist attitude about Chinese characters and their meanings but inconsistent with Xiandai Hanyu Guifan Cidian 3.

• MAIN AUTHORITY FOR 'beautiful jade' AS A DEFINITION FOR ㄏㄨㄟ : "珲（琿）huī 名 <文>一种美玉。地名“瑷珲”（在黑龙江）现在改为“爱辉”。另见593页hún。" 现代汉语规范词典3 Xiandai Hanyu Guifan Cidian 3, p583
• ㄏㄨㄣˊ: "珲（琿）hún 名 <文>一种美玉。另见583页huī。" 现代汉语规范词典3 Xiandai Hanyu Guifan Cidian 3, p593
• 现代汉语词典7 Xiandai Hanyu Cidian 7, p 578 & p 588 do not mention definitions related to 'beautiful jade' for either pronunciation of 珲（琿）and only mention geography examples- Aihui and Hunchun.
• 辞海6 Cihai 6, p. 982 gives the 'beautiful jade' definition for 珲（琿）hún and references Jiyun while p. 972 does not give a 'beautiful jade' definition for 珲（琿）huī.
• 集韻 Jiyun "䰟胡昆切[...]琿美玉" [4]

In my 2018 edit, I probably did not consult Cihai and definitely not Jiyun since I didn't mention it in the edit notes. Omission of 'beautiful jade' from Cihai's definition does not mean ㄏㄨㄟ doesn't have that meaning per se, but it does seem implied that the ㄏㄨㄣˊ definition means 'beautiful jade' and that ㄏㄨㄟ doesn't or that it's not worth mentioning. Jiyun seems to mean that 琿 means 'beautiful jade' and it's pronounced like 䰟, and doesn't comment on anything like ㄏㄨㄟ. On the other hand, Xiandai Hanyu Cidian doesn't mention 'beautiful jade' for either definition, although other characters of this kind (with the jade radical & having no particular meaning) do have that definition (for instance, page 1026 gives the generic 'beautiful jade' definition for both 琦 and 琪).

I believe that new Chinese characters and new definitions for existing Chinese characters can be created today. We can make up new stuff today (the important thing for Wiktionary is that someone else made it up and that we are not making it up). That is antithetical to some schools of thought, but I see those schools of thought on the same level as English speakers who say "that's not a word" when encountering a newly developed word. I believe that the authors of Xiandai Hanyu Guifan Cidian 3 were applying the normative, generic 'beautiful jade' definition to another pronunciation for a generic phono-semantic character with jade as the radical and hence that although this may have been a newer application of the definition for this character's ㄏㄨㄟ pronunciation, that it could potentially still be valid for Wiktionary if this definition is seen anywhere else/has gained acceptance elsewhere. I don't know where exactly to go to prove that acceptance, and I don't see clear evidence of it elsewhere, for instance [5]. I leave this here as a touchstone for future editors who look into this issue. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 11:12, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

@Geographyinitiative I was using the second edition of 现代汉语规范词典 and apparently I have misread as it says huī can be used for the beautiful jade sense. I will revert my edit. RcAlex36 (talk) 11:38, 17 May 2021 (UTC)

@RcAlex36 Hey, you're a native speaker of Cantonese. I just want to ask you: what is up with all the 'beautiful jade' Chinese characters? I mean what's the deal? Who started all these seemingly meaningless characters? I understand jade is prized, but the number of characters with the meaningless definition 'beautiful jade' is mind boggling. I guess that there are low-frequency nearly meaningless characters like this from other radicals, but they just aren't used as much, right? Why are these characters so prized in Chinese? Are they just used in people's names (and maybe geographic names) for numerological or supersitious reasons? There has got to be something more than "beautiful jade" to these characters that influences usage, and if there is, Wiktionary should mention it. If the number of strokes or the Wuxing meaning of the character influences how people choose names, that's a legitimate usage note for characters like 琦 and 琪. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 13:07, 17 May 2021 (UTC)