The Erya is the oldest surviving Chinese dictionary or Chinese encyclopedia known. Bernhard Karlgren (1931: 49) concluded that "the major part of its glosses must reasonably date from" the 3rd century BC.

Chinese scholars interpret the first title character er" (爾; "you, your; adverbial suffix") as a phonetic loan character for the homophonous er (邇; "near; close; approach"), and believe the second ya (雅; "proper; correct; refined; elegant") refers to words or language. According to W. South Coblin (1993: 94): "The interpretation of the title as something like 'approaching what is correct, proper, refined' is now widely accepted." It has been translated as "The Literary Expositor," "The Ready Rectifier" (both by James Legge), and "Progress Towards Correctness" (A. von Rosthorn). "Approaching Elegance/Refinement," Alex Kolesnikov.

The book's author is unknown. Although it is traditionally attributed to the Duke of Zhou, Confucius, or his disciples, scholarship suggests that someone compiled and edited diverse glosses from commentaries to pre-Qin texts, especially the Shijing. The Erya was considered the authoritative lexicographic guide to Chinese classic texts during the Han Dynasty, and it was officially categorised as one of the Thirteen Confucian Classics during the Song Dynasty. The best-known textual annotations include the Western Jin Dynasty Erya zhu (爾雅注; "Erya Commentary") by Guo Pu (郭璞; 276-324 CE), the Northern Song Dynasty Erya shu (爾雅疏; "Erya Subcommentary") by Xing Bing (邢昺; 931-1010), the Song Dynasty Eryayi (爾雅翼; "Wings to the Erya") by Luo Yuan (羅願; 1136–1184), and the Qing Dynasty Erya zhengyi (爾雅正義; "Correct Meanings of the Erya") by Shao Jinhan (邵晋涵; 1743–1796) and Erya yishu (爾雅義疏 "Subcommentary on Meanings of the Erya") by Hao Yixing (郝懿行; 1757–1825).

The Erya has been described as a dictionary, glossary, synonymicon, thesaurus, and encyclopaedia. Karlgren (1931: 46) explains that the book "is not a dictionary in abstracto, it is a collection of direct glosses to concrete passages in ancient texts." The received text contains 2094 entries, covering about 4300 words, and a total of 13,113 characters. It is divided into nineteen sections, the first of which is subdivided into two parts. The title of each chapter combines shi ("explain; elucidate") with a term describing the words under definition. Seven chapters (4, 8, 9, 10, 12, 18, and 19) are organized into taxonomies. For instance, chapter 4 defines terms for: paternal clan (宗族), maternal relatives (母黨), wife's relatives (妻黨), and marriage (婚姻). The text is divided between the first three heterogeneous chapters defining abstract words and the last sixteen semantically-arranged chapters defining concrete words. The last seven – concerning grasses, trees, insects and reptiles, fish, birds, wild animals, and domestic animals – describe more than 590 kinds of flora and fauna. It is a valuable document of natural history and historical biogeography.

Contents[link]

In the history of Chinese lexicography, nearly all dictionaries were internally organized with systems of character radicals, first introduced in the Shuowen Jiezi. However, a few notable exceptions followed the Erya's arrangement by semantic categories like Heaven and Earth. The Ming Dynasty scholar Lang Kuijin (郎奎金) categorized and published the Wuya (五雅 "Five [Er]yas"): Erya, Xiao Erya ("Little Erya"), Guangya ("Expanded Erya"), Piya ("Increased Erya"), and Yìyǎ ("Lost Erya" or the Shiming). Chinese leishu (Chinese: 類書; Wade–Giles: lei-shu; "reference works arranged by categories; encyclopedias"), such as the Yongle Encyclopedia, were also semantically arranged.

Owing to its laconic lexicographical style, the Erya is the only Chinese classic that has not been fully translated into English. However, there are several unpublished PhD dissertations translating particular chapters.

See also[link]

Chinese Wikisource has original text related to this article: The Erya (in Chinese)

• Xiao Erya
• Shiming
• Guangya
• Piya

References[link]

• Coblin, W. South (1993). "Erh ya" in Michael Loewe (ed.), Early Chinese Texts: A Bibliographical Guide, pp 94–99 (Berkeley: The Society for the Study of Early China) ISBN 1-55729-043-1.
• Karlgren, Bernhard. (1931). "The Early History of the Chou Li and Tso Chuan Texts". Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities 3: 1–59.
• Von Rosthorn, A. (1975). The Erh-ya and Other Synonymicons. Journal of the Chinese Language Teachers Association 10.3, 137–145.

External links[link]

• The Erya Complete text in Chinese
• The Erya 爾雅 Dictionary, Chinaknowledge article
• Erh-ya, photo of a rare Song Dynasty edition in National Palace Museum (Taipei)

v t e Dictionaries of Chinese Chinese dictionaries Character dictionaries (字典 Zìdiǎn) Zhonghua Da Zidian • Hanyu Da Zidian • Shuowen Jiezi • Shiming • Longkan Shoujian • Kangxi Dictionary • Ganlu Zishu • Fangyan • Zhonghua Zihai Phrase dictionaries (詞典 Cídiǎn) Zihui Zhengzitong • Ziyuan • Zhongwen Da Cidian • Zhengzitong • Yupian • Xinhua Zidian • Xiao Erya • Piya • Jingdian Shiwen • Hanyu Da Cidian • Xiandai Hanyu Cidian • Guangya • Erya Rime dictionaries Qieyun • Guangyun • Jiyun • Yunjing • Qiyin lüe • Menggu Ziyun • Zhongyuan Yinyun • Qi Lin Bayin • Peiwen Yunfu Foreign dictionaries of Chinese, Chinese characters or Sino-Xenic vocabularies Character dictionaries (字典 Zìdiǎn) Hán Việt Tự điển (Vietnam) Phrase dictionaries (詞典 Cídiǎn) Dai Kan-Wa Jiten (Japan) • Han-Han Dae Sajeon (South Korea) • CEDICT • Adsotrans • Thesaurus Linguae Sericae List of Chinese dictionaries

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

Gadjo is also the Romani word for non-Romani people.

This biographical article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding reliable sources. Contentious material about living persons that is unsourced or poorly sourced must be removed immediately, especially if potentially libelous or harmful. (April 2011)

Gadjo is the alias of the German DJ, producer and remixer, Murat Arslan. He is best known for his hit "So Many Times", featuring Alexandra Prince on vocals. It became an international club hit in the winter of 2005, peaking in 2006 (although it peaked at no. 22 in May 2005, in the UK Singles Chart)^[1] Gadjo has already produced and remixed some work for musicians including, Basement Jaxx and David Morales.

In 2007, he launched his own record label and booking agency, Torntape Booking & Artists and Records.

Erick Morillo signed him to Subliminal Records in 2005. His first major hit single "So Many Times" reached #1 in fourteen countries' dance charts. This included a spell at #1 in the US Billboard Hot Dance Club Songs chart, and it peaked at #22 in the UK Singles Chart.^[2] It led to a nomination as “Best House Track Award 2006” at the International Dance Music Awards.

References[link]

External links[link]

• US record label
• Gadjo's Booking Agency