Sky Curtain: My Great Qin must have an aircraft carrier!

This example illustrates how a war or a revolution could cause the original group of people who wrote to say goodbye to writing.

Chinese characters are the most precious treasure of the Chinese nation, but in that era when the West was strong and the East was weak, and we had great doubts, we almost lost Chinese characters.

It's easy to throw things away, but hard to pick them up again.

Fortunately, Chinese civilization has not made any mistakes in its innovations, and has not suffered the same predicament as Vietnam and Korea, which completely abandoned Chinese characters.

The core of East Asian Han culture has always been firmly in the hands of the Chinese people themselves.

Under the sky, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

Fortunately, Chinese characters did not turn into those strange symbols, and the cultural heritage of China is still intact.

Zhu Yuanzhang was amused when he saw the names Jiaozhi and Goryeo.

"Oh ho, are you still making a spectacle of these two spots here?"

"That wretched place, Jiaozhi, I once considered whether to reclaim it, but now it seems they've even abandoned the Chinese characters, what use is it?"

"And then there's Goryeo, coming to pay tribute every year like a subservient grandson, but secretly they don't even recognize their ancestors' writing system anymore, bah!"

"It's better to destroy it, so as not to waste our precious Chinese treasures."

Zhu Yuanzhang pondered for a moment and added an edict: "Send word to the Ministry of Rites that from now on, all official documents sent as tribute by vassal states must be in Chinese. Those who cannot write Chinese will not be allowed to enter the pass."

These vassal states, eating the food of the Ming Dynasty and learning the Ming Dynasty's language, turned their backs on us once they gained power.

Since that's the case, there's no need to be so polite to them.

……

In Changchun Garden, Emperor Kangxi's pen never stopped, rapidly recording the contents of the sky on Xuan paper.

But his face already looked terrible.

The West is stronger than the East.

He chewed over and over those four words several times, and the more he chewed, the more bitter they became.

To the west of the Qing Dynasty, the nearest people were the Dzungars, and to the farthest were those red-haired, blue-eyed Westerners.

The Dzungar Khanate was indeed a troublesome situation, but it was absolutely impossible for them to force the Qing Dynasty to the point of abolishing the Chinese characters.

Therefore, there is only one answer: it's those Westerners.

Before the curtain of heaven, we talked about the Industrial Revolution and the steam engine. Now we're talking about the West being stronger than the East and almost losing the Chinese characters.

Put together, these words make a very clear meaning: the later Qing Dynasty was suppressed and beaten by Westerners.

Moreover, the fighting was so fierce that even scholars began to doubt whether there was something wrong with their own culture.

"Li Guangdi, what's the current situation with the navies of the coastal provinces?"

Upon hearing this, Li Guangdi stepped forward, carefully recalled the events, and then answered loudly, "Your Majesty, since the suppression of the Three Feudatories, the size of the navy has been reduced, and it is currently mainly used for patrols."

"The imperial decree was issued to the Ministry of War, forbidding the reduction of the naval force, strengthening the defense of the ports, and paying close attention to the movements of the Western barbarians."

Kangxi didn't explain anything, and directly issued the order.

He didn't believe that a large Western army could travel thousands of miles to reach Qing territory.

The only possibility is at sea.

Although Emperor Kangxi did not believe that the Qing Dynasty would fall to such a state, he still understood the importance of taking precautions.

1936 years.

The alleyways of Shanghai were packed with citizens watching the sky dome.

The ladies in cheongsams, the newspaper boys, and the rickshaw pullers all craned their necks to look up at the sky.

Hu Shih sat in his study, and after reading this passage, he took off his glasses and wiped them.

"In the end, it was saved."

He dedicated most of his life to the vernacular language movement, all in order to make articles and newspapers more accessible to a wider audience.

As for whether or not Chinese characters should be abolished, he and Lu Xun argued about it for quite some time.

In retrospect, despite the twists and turns, China ultimately chose innovation rather than rupture.

This is undoubtedly an affirmation of their abilities!

In modern times, the government at the time believed that the reason for the country's weakness was the disunity of the people.

The reason for the disunity among the people is language confusion, so it was decided to create a standardized Mandarin pronunciation.

"What the hell?"

Ying Zheng stared at the sky for a long time, still unable to figure it out.

What does a nation's weakness have to do with language?

A weak nation is either due to a useless army, a foolish monarch, or corrupt officials.

If public morale is low, it's because the laws aren't strict enough and their enforcement isn't harsh enough; it's a matter of killing one group and replacing it with another.

As for language, he unified the scripts of the six states, wasn't that enough?

Ying Zheng felt that people in later generations were clearly looking for a high-sounding excuse for their incompetence!

Li Shimin, on the contrary, thought there was some truth to it: "Now the Tang Dynasty has a vast territory, with more than a dozen tribes such as the Turks and Uyghurs. Every time we go there, we have to bring a translator with us."

"If people cannot communicate, the country will naturally weaken."

"The Tang Dynasty's educational achievements should also focus more on this aspect."

Fang Xuanling listened from the side, nodding frequently.

The Tang Dynasty was known for its inclusiveness, accepting people of all races and backgrounds, but the management costs were also extremely high.

The annual expenses for translating documents and passwords alone are enough to support an elite cavalry force.

What about Zhu Yuanzhang?

"Why bother with all this fancy stuff?"

Old Zhu put the brush down on the table, looking dismissive. "Ordinary people, as long as they can farm and pay taxes, that's enough."

"If your mind is filled with too many thoughts, thinking about this today and that tomorrow, won't you just become restless?"

"National governance should rely on swords and whips to make the people honestly cultivate the land and pay taxes. Anyone who dares to have any wild ideas should be beheaded!"

"Using a unified language would only facilitate organizing rebellions and create more chaos."

-

The young man on the canopy spoke in a relaxed tone, discussing the specific process.

As we all know, setting standards is never a smooth process. Representatives from different provinces argue endlessly, each believing that their local dialect is the authentic national pronunciation.

This issue was debated for several years, and in the end, it was simply changed to a vote; whoever got the most votes was right.

[After finally choosing Mandarin as the national language, it was overturned and started all over again after only a few years of promotion.]

"Ha!" Zhu Yuanzhang chuckled. "Scholars never get together; they're always arguing!"

The ministers in the imperial court held discussions for three days straight, arguing heatedly until they reached no conclusion.

Why not have Zhu Yuanzhang make the decision?

Why bother? Just listen to us, isn't that enough?

Interestingly, while no consensus was reached on standard pronunciation, the design of the pinyin system proceeded smoothly.

The master calligrapher Zhang Taiyan created a unique set of symbols based on the radicals and components of Chinese characters, which later became known as the "Phonetic Symbols".

This set of symbols is simple and clear, and is sufficient to cover all pronunciations of Chinese.

It is worth mentioning that, even today, people in Taiwan still use this phonetic symbol system.

The entire set of Zhuyin symbols was displayed on the screen: ㄅㄆㄇㄈ, ㄉㄊㄋㄌ...

Scholars from various dynasties strained their eyes to identify it, and the more they looked, the more familiar it seemed.

"Isn't this a radical from seal script?"

"Brilliant! By taking the form of the radical and using the sound of the character, it neither deviates from the foundation of Chinese characters nor fails to find a new path. It is worthy of the name of a master."

Tokyo, 1906.

Zhang Taiyan was sitting in his cramped rented room, with a pile of manuscript papers spread out in front of him.

He had just been released from prison, penniless, with only a wealth of knowledge and a burning resentment in his heart.

As dawn broke, he was revising the manuscript of "New Dialects".

When he saw his name appear on the sky, Zhang Taiyan's hand holding the pen trembled slightly.

He created the phonetic symbols in order to eradicate illiteracy as much as possible.

Many people called him crazy, saying he was arrogant and overconfident.

But Tianmu gave him an explanation: what you did was not in vain, and future generations are still using it.

"Our compatriots on the island are still using it..." Zhang Taiyan muttered these words and gave a bitter smile.

What exactly did China go through to create a precious island?

But that's a story for another time.

What he is more concerned about now is the relationship between the pinyin that Tianmu talks about and his own phonetic symbols.

Is it replacement or parallel operation?

Zhang Taiyan picked up his pen again and wrote a few words on the blank space of the manuscript paper:

"Phonetic notation is the ladder to Chinese characters. As long as the ladder exists, the path to mastery will never end."