Classical Chinese Wikipedia
 | |
Type of site | Internet encyclopedia project |
|---|---|
| Available in | Classical Chinese |
| Owner | Wikimedia Foundation |
| Website | zh-classical |
| Commercial | No |
| Registration | Optional |
| Launched | 31 July 2006 |
| Classical Chinese Wikipedia | |||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 文言維基大典 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | 文言维基大典 | ||||||
| |||||||
The Classical Chinese Wikipedia (Classical Chinese: 文言維基大典; pinyin: Wényán wéijī dàdiǎn; Written vernacular Chinese: 文言文維基百科; pinyin: Wényánwén wéijī bǎikē) is the Classical Chinese edition of Wikipedia, run by the Wikimedia Foundation. It started on 31 July 2006, coincidentally the Qixi Festival[1][2] (7th day of the 7th month on the Chinese calendar). As of June 2017[update], the Classical Chinese Wikipedia had a total of 6,308 articles.
Background[edit]
Editors are mainly Wikipedians who have studied Classical Chinese, thus resulting in the slow growth of editors with very few readers. With the increase of articles related to the History of China, there are over 500 users as of May 2007, including those with no ability in Classical Chinese but are interested in the language.
There are 16 active editors, 1 Very active editor, & one new editor as of December 2018.[3]
History[edit]
- 31 July 2006 - Creation[4][5]
- 4 April 2007 - Number of articles over 1,000
- 4 November 2012 - Number of articles approximately 2,780
- 27 December 2012 - Number of articles approximately 2,820
- 6 April 2013 - Number of articles approximately 3,009
- December 2018 - Approximately 8,741 Articles[3]
Subtitle / Slogan[edit]
The Classical Chinese Wikipedia has a subtitle: 文辭雅正 學問淵深[6] (Wéncí yǎzhèng, xuéwèn yuānshēn), Which means: "Correct and elegant diction, profound knowledge".
Naming and logo problems[edit]
Just like Chinese Wikipedia, there was a need to have an official name for Wikipedia in the Classical Chinese language. There were suggestions to use 百科 (bǎikē, meaning 'encyclopedia') as part of the name, which is also in use for Chinese Wikipedia. The names Erya (爾雅, ěryǎ) and 大典 (dàdiǎn, literally 'great dictionary', meaning 'encyclopedia') were also considered. Finally, the official Classical Chinese name of Wikipedia, 維基大典 was adopted.[7] The name 爾雅 ěryǎ is adopted for the Classical Chinese edition of Wiktionary.
At the start, the logo of the Classical Chinese Wikipedia had been in English. Later, the official name and slogan was inscribed into the logo.[8] The logo is written right-to-left, akin to traditional Chinese writing styles.
Administration[edit]
- See also Wikipedia:Requests for adminship, Wikipedia:Administrator elections/Archive and Wikipedia:Administrator elections/Unsuccessful adminship candidacies
There is only one administrator (有秩 Yǒu zhì) in Classical Chinese Wikipedia, Itsmine,[9] a Hong Konger. He is elected by Wikipedians with 18 supporting and zero opposing,[10] meeting the criteria of having at least 10 supporting and at least 70% majority.[11] He also has an alternative user name, Kongming Jushi, (Chinese: 孔明居士; pinyin: Kǒngmíng jūshì; literally: 'Householder/layperson Kongming'), which he uses to address himself and to sign off when replying to talk pages. He admires Zhuge Liang,[12] who had the style name of Kongming.
He contributed to the vernacular Chinese edition of Wikipedia with the username of Itsminecookies and is awarded various service awards.[13] He also contributed to the English Wikipedia.[14]
Articles posted in Classical Chinese Wikipedia are classified in three categories, using the flagged revisions policy from German Wikipedia.[15]
Classification of pages[edit]
The Classical Chinese Wikipedia follows the way German Wikipedia classifies its pages. The German Wikipedia classifies its pages into eight main portals on the Main Page.[16][17] The Classical Chinese Wikipedia classifies its pages into four main portals, namely 經 (jing, Science), 史 (shi, History), 子 (zi, Philosophy) and 集 (ji, Arts), displayed on the Main Page.[18][19]
Unique features[edit]
Poetry appreciation[edit]
The Classical Chinese Wikipedia contains a poetry appreciation section for readers to appreciate Chinese poetry and to add on to self-cultivation.[20]
Comparison between Chinese and Classical Chinese Wikipedia terms[edit]
The following are comparisons of Wikipedia terms used between Chinese Wikipedia and Classical Chinese Wikipedia.
Namespaces[edit]
Namespaces are known as 名字空間 Míngzì kōngjiān in Written Vernacular Chinese.
| English Wikipedia | Chinese Wikipedia | Classical Chinese Wikipedia |
|---|---|---|
| Project page | 项目页面 Xiàngmù |
策頁 Cè |
| Help page | 幫助頁面 Bāngzhù |
助頁 Zhù |
| User page | 用戶頁面 Yònghù |
齋頁 / 用戶頁 Zhāi / Yònghù |
| File page | 文件頁面 / 檔案頁面 Wénjiàn / Dǎng'àn |
檔頁 Dàng |
| Template page | 模板頁面 Múbǎn |
模頁 Mú |
| Portal page | 主題頁面 Zhǔtí |
門頁 Mén |
| Special page | 特殊頁面 Tèshū |
奇頁 Qí |
Classical Chinese edition of Wiktionary[edit]
- Visit Classical Chinese Wiktionary.
The Classical Chinese edition of Wiktionary is known as 維基爾雅 (pinyin: Wéijī ěr yǎ; literally: 'Wiki Erya').[21][22] However, interestingly, it is not affiliated to the multi-lingual Wiktionary (www.wiktionary.org). It is located in Classical Chinese Wikipedia itself.
The vernacular Chinese edition of Wiktionary is affiliated to the multi-lingual Wiktionary and records vernacular Chinese terms and explanations in vernacular Chinese. Also, entry pages are also linked to other languages where a Chinese entry is explained in another language other than Chinese. Moreover, words from other languages can be searched in Chinese Wiktionary for explanations in Chinese. Thus, Wiktionary is indeed a multi-lingual dictionary.
The Classical Chinese edition of Wiktionary records Classical Chinese terms and are explained in Classical Chinese according to ancient dictionaries. Ancient terms may be profound, a character has various meanings and ambiguity, and the purpose of Weiji Erya is to benefit Wikipedians and entries are recorded. Modern, scientific and technological terms are also recorded because of Western influence today.
However, only meanings of characters or one-character term are recorded in Weiji Erya. Hence, the Classical Chinese edition of Wiktionary functions as a 'single-character dictionary' (Chinese: 字典; pinyin: zìdiǎn; literally: 'Character-dictionary').
The Classical Chinese Wiktionary is under the Wikipedia namespace in Classical Chinese Wikipedia. Therefore, "Classical Chinese Wiktionarians" are also or are in fact Wikipedians. Strictly speaking, it is not affiliated to the multi-lingual Wiktionary, thus entries are still articles in Wikipedia. It is still managed by Classical Chinese Wikipedia administrator.
The radical index (categorising characters according to their radicals)[23] is provided for people who cannot type the character.
Script[edit]
The Classical Chinese Wikipedia retains most of the Chinese culture, tradition and history in the articles and other pages.
It uses and is written in Traditional Chinese characters exclusively. It does not use Arabic numerals but uses unified Chinese numerals.[24] However, due to the limitations in technology[25] of writing scripts in vertical writing format, the Classical Chinese Wikipedia could only publish Classical Chinese poetry and certain articles/pages in vertical writing. At the same time, it adopts modern Chinese punctuation to replace the traditional way of annotating without any punctuations (simplified Chinese: 句读; traditional Chinese: 句讀; pinyin: Jùdòu).
Year numbering system and type of calendar used[edit]
In the articles created, the type of calendar (e.g. Gregorian calendar, Chinese calendar) used is not unified nor consistent, and the year numbering system also vary.
However, [26] for anything related to the Chinese history or Chinese, it must be displayed in the regnal year of the Chinese era name or other numbering systems, e.g. the Sexagenary cycle, to be linked to the Gregorian year. For instance, [[五八一年|開皇元年]] ( [[581|Kaihuang 1]] ).[27] For Western-related topics, the Gregorian calendar or year can be displayed. For instance, [[五八一年]] ( [[581]] ). But the Chinese calendar/year can also be used.
As for Chinese topics, the day and month of dates before 1 January 1912 (establishment of the Republic of China) shown must follow the Chinese calendar.
Limitations[edit]
As there are fewer people proficient in Literary Chinese writing than those proficient in Modern Chinese, and that majority are used to reading Modern Chinese, with the fact that there are many people not knowing much about Classical Chinese, resulting in the quality of quite a number of edits not reaching the Literary Chinese Standard. This causes limitations in the development of the Classical Chinese Wikipedia. In addition, biographies of living persons cannot be written on Classical Chinese Wikipedia.
Most of the articles are short articles. Due to the lack of Classical Chinese talents and Wikipedians, most of the articles did not have sections. Certain articles cannot be expanded to be more informative or having citations in pages. The development of the Classical Chinese Wikipedia is slow and certain features of Wikipedia cannot be implemented.
Controversies[edit]
- See also the ineffective straw-poll page on Chinese Wikipedia, Wikipedia:Straw polls/Removal of the Classical Chinese Wikipedia, but contains opinions and discussions of the topic.
Classical Chinese Wikipedia received several negative feedback and criticism from the Chinese Wikipedia community, some asking for the removal of it.
Upsuper[edit]
The user Upsuper or Crazy Ghost (疯鬼) thinks that it should be removed because an encyclopedia gives readers some references and allows readers to gain new knowledge, and "almost no one would visit the Classical Chinese Wikipedia" for references of contemporary information that the vernacular Chinese edition contains nor gaining new knowledge in the present world.
Related[edit]
Classical Chinese is an archaic register of Chinese with grammar and vocabulary drawn from classical works.
Classical Chinese is a member to the family of Chinese languages. For other members, some Wikipedias have seen established among Wikimedia projects.
- Chinese Wikipedia
- Minnan Wikipedia (Main Page)
- Cantonese Wikipedia (Main Page)
- Mindong Wikipedia (Main Page)
- Gan Wikipedia (Main Page), Wu Wikipedia (Main Page)
- Hakka Wikipedia (Main Page).
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ↑ Chinapage.com - Qixi Festival
- ↑ Baidu Zhidao - Which day in 2006 does the Qixi Festival fall in?
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 "Wikimedia project at a glance". stats.wikimedia.org. Archived from the original on 2023-03-23. Retrieved 2023-12-14.
- ↑ 【維基專題】文言維基起源
- ↑ "【維基專題】王鐘銘編辭目挺文言". Archived from the original on 2017-01-07. Retrieved 2017-01-06. Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ File:Wikipedia-logo-v2-zh-classical.png
- ↑ Classical Chinese edition of this article
- ↑ Classical Chinese edition of this article
- ↑ The user page of Itsmine
- ↑ Wikipedia:Administrator elections/Archive
- ↑ Wikipedia:Requests for adminship
- ↑ The user page of Itsminecookies
- ↑ The user page of Itsminecookies
- ↑ Special:Contributions/Itsmine
- ↑ 文言維基試行穩定版本
- ↑ Wikipedia:Portal#What are portals?
- ↑ Main Page of German Wikipedia
- ↑ Classical Chinese edition of this article
- ↑ Main Page of Classical Chinese Wikipedia
- ↑ Wikipedia:Poetry appreciation
- ↑ Classical Chinese Wiktionary
- ↑ Classical Chinese edition of this article
- ↑ Wikipedia:Wiktionary/Radical index
- ↑ Help:Contents
- ↑ Wikipedia:Village pump#I have a question
- ↑ Wikipedia:Year numbering system
- ↑ Help:Contents
External links[edit]
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Classical Chinese Wikipedia. |
 |
文言 edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
This article "Classical Chinese Wikipedia" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Classical Chinese Wikipedia. Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.
