Yan Chongnian | The Value of the Manchu Script
Yan Chongnian | The Value of the Manchu Script
Edited and Translated by: MING YE
9/29/20268 min read
Yan Chongnian | The Value of the Manchu Script
Edited and Translated by: MING YE
After the Manchu script was created and put into use, it served as an official written language during the period when the Manchus were developing their state outside the Great Wall. After the Qing established its capital in Beijing, Manchu became the dynasty's “national script” (guoshu, 国书) and was used alongside Chinese as an official written language for exercising state authority, issuing imperial orders, and conducting governmental and external communications.
The creation of the Manchu script therefore possessed considerable historical and cultural significance. Its principal value may be summarized in the following ten areas.
1. Establishing Manchu-Language Education
Before the rise of the Manchus, neither the Jianzhou Jurchens nor the Haixi Jurchens had developed a comparable formal school system for their own written language.
After the creation of the Manchu script, Nurhaci ordered the appointment of teachers to provide instruction in Manchu.
According to the Annotated Translation of the Old Manchu Archives (《满文老档译注》), the khan issued an order appointing eight men—Juntoi, Bobuhe, Sahaliyan, Ubatai, Yasingga, Kobei, Jahai, and Hundai—as teachers for the Eight Banners. These bakši, or learned instructors, were expected to devote themselves to teaching their students. Those who mastered their studies were to be rewarded, while students who failed to study diligently or acquire literacy could be punished. The eight teachers themselves were exempted from other duties so that they could concentrate on education.
The Later Jin thus developed specialized teachers devoted to Manchu-language literacy.
This was an important development. A newly created writing system could only become socially significant if people were able to learn and use it. The establishment of Manchu-language education therefore provided an institutional foundation for the spread of Manchu literacy.
2. Issuing Government Orders Directly in Manchu
Before the creation of the Manchu script, political orders, military reports, and other documents of the Jianzhou Jurchens were often recorded in Mongolian or Chinese.
When such military and administrative orders were communicated to Jurchen-speaking audiences, they then had to be translated into the spoken language.
The creation of Manchu writing changed this situation.
Government affairs, military commands, and administrative orders could now be recorded and communicated directly in Manchu.
This made communication between the Later Jin government, the nobility, and the broader Jurchen population more direct and efficient.
During the period before the Qing conquest of China proper, Manchu therefore functioned as an official written language of the emerging state.
After the capital was established in Beijing, it became the Qing dynasty's “national script”, used alongside Chinese in the exercise of imperial authority and in official governmental communications.
3. Contributing to the Rise and Consolidation of the Manchus
The Manchu script spread rapidly after its creation.
The development of a written language not only strengthened literacy and cultural development among the Manchus, but also provided a new means through which knowledge from Chinese civilization could be translated and absorbed.
In this respect, two institutional developments were especially significant:
the creation of the Manchu script and the establishment of the Eight Banners.
One provided a shared written medium; the other provided a powerful form of military and social organization.
Together, they helped connect previously dispersed communities and contributed to the formation and consolidation of a broader Manchu political and cultural community.
The Manchu script also made it possible to translate Chinese historical and political works, providing the emerging Later Jin and Qing leadership with access to accumulated experience in government and administration.
The development of Manchu literacy therefore formed one part of the larger transformation that accompanied the rise of the Manchu state.
4. Preserving the Manchu Language
One of the greatest historical values of the Manchu script is that it preserved the Manchu language in written form.
Many peoples who played important roles in ancient Chinese history left relatively little direct written evidence of their spoken languages.
The situation with Manchu is very different.
Because Manchu possessed a writing system and produced a substantial body of written material, scholars today can reconstruct and study its vocabulary, grammar, phonology, terminology, and historical development.
Although Manchu later declined dramatically as an everyday spoken language, the enormous written corpus survived.
The script therefore became a kind of linguistic archive.
Without Manchu writing, much of what is now known about the historical Manchu language would have disappeared together with its decline as a community language.
5. Preserving Millions of Manchu Archival Documents
Perhaps the most important scholarly value of Manchu lies in the enormous quantity of archival material written in the language.
Throughout the Qing dynasty, Manchu was widely used in governmental administration.
This was especially true during the reigns of Nurhaci, Hong Taiji, Shunzhi, Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong.
One of the earliest and most important bodies of surviving Manchu documentation is the collection commonly associated with the undotted Old Manchu archives, including materials known as the Old Manchu Archives and related early archival records.
These documents preserve primary historical information from before the Qing conquest of China proper.
Some of their contents have no exact equivalent in surviving Chinese-language records.
Manchu archives are particularly important for research into subjects such as:
frontier administration,
ethnic relations,
the imperial court,
military affairs,
Banner institutions,
diplomacy,
and Qing governance.
Large collections of Manchu archival materials are preserved in institutions including the First Historical Archives of China, the Liaoning Provincial Archives, the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Archives, the National Palace Museum in Taipei, and the Institute of History and Philology at Academia Sinica.
The original account estimates that more than two million Manchu archival documents and volumes survive.
Whatever precise total is adopted, the scale of the surviving corpus is extraordinary.
It represents one of the largest surviving bodies of historical documentation written in a minority language in Chinese history.
6. Recording Oral Literature, Shamanic Traditions, and Folklore
The Manchu script also preserved cultural traditions that had previously depended heavily on oral transmission.
Among these are texts associated with Manchu shamanism.
A considerable number of Manchu ritual texts and shamanic invocations have historically circulated among families and communities, and some were preserved without corresponding Chinese translations.
One particularly important work is the Tale of the Nišan Shaman (《尼山萨满传》).
The work survives through Manchu textual traditions and has subsequently been translated into a number of other languages, including Chinese, English, Italian, and Korean.
Because such traditions were recorded in Manchu, aspects of Manchu ritual literature, folklore, oral narrative, religious practice, and collective memory could survive beyond the communities in which they were originally transmitted.
Manchu inscriptions, genealogical books, and other forms of written material further expand this cultural archive.
Thus, Manchu writing preserved not merely governmental history but also important dimensions of everyday and spiritual culture.
7. Preserving Manchu Translations of Chinese Classics and Literature
Even before the Qing conquest of China proper, Manchu scholars had begun translating Chinese works into Manchu.
During the Qing dynasty, this translation activity expanded enormously.
Works translated into Manchu included texts from many different fields.
Among the Confucian classics were works such as the Mencius.
Historical works included the Zizhi Tongjian Gangmu and histories of the Liao, Jin, Yuan, and other dynasties.
Military and philosophical works included the Art of War, the Six Secret Teachings, and the Three Strategies.
Literary works translated into Manchu included such famous titles as:
Romance of the Three Kingdoms,
Water Margin,
The Romance of the Western Chamber,
Dream of the Red Chamber,
Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio,
and Jin Ping Mei.
Buddhist literature was also translated, including major scriptures and the Manchu Buddhist Canon.
The original account estimates that more than one thousand Manchu-language book titles survive.
These translations served as an important bridge between Manchu and Chinese intellectual traditions.
They allowed Manchu readers to gain access to Chinese history, philosophy, military thought, religion, and literature while simultaneously expanding the vocabulary and expressive capacity of written Manchu.
For modern researchers, these translations also provide valuable evidence for studying both Manchu linguistic history and the transmission of Chinese texts across languages.
8. Providing a Model for the Writing Systems of Other Peoples
The Manchu script also influenced the development of writing among other peoples of Northeast and Inner Asia.
The most important example is Sibe.
During the Qing dynasty and the early Republican period, Sibe communities used Manchu writing extensively.
In the twentieth century, Sibe scholars introduced modifications to the Manchu script, contributing to the development of the modern Sibe script.
Today, particularly in Qapqal Sibe Autonomous County in Xinjiang, Sibe continues to be used in education, publishing, broadcasting, cultural activities, and other contexts.
There were also historical attempts to use Manchu letters for writing languages such as Daur.
The historical importance of Manchu writing therefore extends beyond the Manchus themselves.
It became a reference point from which related or neighboring communities could develop written forms for their own languages.
9. Its Value for Cultural Anthropology and the Study of Tungusic Peoples
Manchu documentation is also exceptionally important for the study of the peoples and cultures of Northeast Asia.
Among the peoples now classified within the Tungusic language family, few possess a historical written corpus comparable in scale and chronological depth to that of Manchu.
The earlier Jurchen script, created during the Jin dynasty, largely disappeared from use and survives only in a comparatively limited body of inscriptions and texts.
Other Tungusic languages acquired standardized writing systems much later.
In the Soviet Union, for example, written forms for Evenki, Even, Nanai, and other languages were developed primarily during the twentieth century.
Manchu, by contrast, left an enormous body of documents extending across several centuries.
For this reason, Manchu materials are important for comparative research into the languages, histories, religions, customs, economies, and social structures of the peoples of Northeast Asia.
They can provide comparative evidence relevant to the study of Evenki, Even, Nanai, Oroqen, Negidal, Ulch, Orok, Oroch, Udege, and other Tungusic-speaking peoples.
In this sense, Manchu documents are not valuable only for Qing history.
They also constitute a major resource for the linguistic anthropology and cultural history of Northeast Asia.
10. A Bridge for International Cultural and Scholarly Exchange
Manchu also became an important medium of international scholarship.
Historical Manchu documents are preserved today not only in China but also in collections in countries including Russia, Japan, South Korea, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Italy, and elsewhere.
During the Qing dynasty, European Jesuit missionaries working at the imperial court learned Manchu and used it in their interactions with Qing emperors and officials.
Knowledge concerning astronomy, mathematics, medicine, geography, and other subjects circulated through this multilingual environment.
Manchu translations of Chinese classics could also provide foreign scholars with an additional route into Chinese intellectual traditions.
Over time, dictionaries connecting Manchu with European and Asian languages were compiled and published, including Manchu-Russian, Manchu-German, Manchu-Japanese, and Manchu-English dictionaries.
The translation process could sometimes operate across several linguistic stages:
Chinese → Manchu → Latin → other European languages.
In this way, Manchu became one of the languages through which elements of Chinese traditional culture entered European scholarship.
For some modern researchers, Manchu also offers a practical advantage: unlike Chinese characters, Manchu uses an alphabetic writing system. Scholars already familiar with alphabetic languages can therefore learn to decode Manchu writing relatively systematically, although genuine mastery of the language still requires substantial study.
Manchu consequently remains an important tool for international research into Qing history and the wider history of China and Northeast Asia.
Conclusion: The Creation of the Manchu Script Was a Milestone in Manchu Cultural History
The creation and adoption of the Manchu script represented a major turning point in the cultural history of the Manchus.
For the first time, the emerging Manchu political community possessed a writing system through which it could systematically:
communicate ideas,
issue government documents,
record political affairs,
write history,
transmit knowledge,
and translate works from other languages.
The widespread promotion of Manchu writing under Nurhaci strengthened communication among the different Jurchen communities and provided an important cultural bond during the formation of the Manchu community.
The Later Jin and early Qing governments also ordered the translation of large numbers of Chinese works into Manchu.
Through these translations, Manchu rulers and scholars gained access to the political experience, historical knowledge, philosophy, military thought, and literature accumulated in the Central Plains.
At the same time, the Manchu script preserved an enormous cultural inheritance of its own.
Today, Manchu archives, books, translations, genealogies, inscriptions, shamanic texts, dictionaries, and official documents allow researchers to enter historical worlds that cannot always be reconstructed through Chinese-language sources alone.
The value of Manchu therefore extends far beyond the history of one writing system.
It is simultaneously:
a record of a language,
an archive of the Qing dynasty,
a repository of Manchu cultural memory,
a source for the study of Northeast Asia,
and a historical bridge connecting different languages and civilizations.
Original Author: Yan Chongnian (阎崇年)
Edited and Translated by: MING YE