Mnementh said:
Chinese borrowed some elements from other languages, but not too much. Korean and Japanese on the other hand - borrowed the chinese writing system. I can't speak for Korean, but for Japanese at least the chinese writing system doesn't match. In Chinese every written character is a syllable, in japanese not. In chinese the grammar doesn't change the words itself (suffixes or prefixes). That's why the chinese characters are working. In japanese the words are changed. That's why the japanese writing adds another alphabet for this reason. It looks ugly if you compare texts in japanese with texts in chinese. At least the japanese writing-system is a hell of a bastard. |
Right, Japan adapted their writing, and I suppose quite a few of the words (or word-fragments, at least) from Chinese. But wouldn't Chinese be an "origin" tongue, set as the basis of far eastern civilization?

Monster Hunter: pissing me off since 2010.







