Jianghuai Mandarin, also known as Lower Yangtze Mandarin and named for the Yangtze and Huai rivers running through its territory, is spoken across central Anhui, eastern Hubei, the part of Jiangsu north of the Yangtze and the area around Nanjing, with scattered communities in Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan and Fujian descended from Ming dynasty soldiers. It had an estimated 86 million speakers as of 2012, up from an earlier 1987 estimate of 67 million. It is one of the most divergent and least mutually intelligible Mandarin varieties, distinguished by its retention of the final glottal stops of Middle Chinese stop consonants that most other Mandarin dialects have lost.
Facts
RegionSpoken in central Anhui, eastern Hubei, most of Jiangsu north of the Yangtze, and the area around Nanjing, China. 1 Speaker CommunityEstimated at 67 million speakers in 1987; also historically carried by Ming-era military and civilian settlers into pockets of Guangdong, Guangxi, Hainan and Fujian. 1 Distinguishing FeaturesA characteristic feature is the treatment of Middle Chinese syllable-final stops: unlike most Mandarin varieties, where the stops disappeared, Jianghuai stop codas merged into a single glottal stop, while remaining distinct from the four tonal categories shared with the rest of Mandarin. 1 Classification
Variety Kind Connections
Descends From
Source Wikipedia: Jianghuai Mandarin
Is A Kind Of Variety
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Sources
1. Wikipedia: Jianghuai Mandarin
Wikimedia FoundationGeographic distribution section
The number of speakers was estimated in 1987 at 67 million.
Phonology section
In Lower Yangtze Mandarin, however, the stop codas have merged as a glottal stop, but these syllables remain separate from the four tonal categories shared with other Mandarin varieties.
Lead section
Jianghuai Mandarin is spoken in central Anhui, eastern Hubei, most of Jiangsu north of the Yangtze, as well as the area around Nanjing.
Descends From: Mandarin Chinese, Lead
is one of the most divergent and least mutually-intelligible of the Mandarin language varieties
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