Four-corner method: Difference between revisions

Revision as of 20:03, 11 April 2024

Latest revision as of 16:57, 28 August 2024

(2 intermediate revisions by 2 users not shown)

Line 7:

The four digits encode the shapes found in the four corners of the symbol, upper left to lower right. Although this does not uniquely identify a Chinese character, it leaves only a very short list of possibilities. A fifth digit can be added to describe an extra part above the lower right if necessary.

The four-corner method, in its three revisions, was supported by the Chinese state for a while, and is found in numerous older reference works and some still in publication. The small ''Kangorin Sino-Japanese Dictionary'' by Yoneyama had a four-corner index when it was introduced in the 1980s, but it has been since been deleted. However, it is not in common usage today, although dictionaries using it are available. It is identified, in public opinion, with the time when many Chinese were illiterate and the language was not yet unified; more Chinese today use the dictionary to help them write, not read. But it is useful for scholars, clerks, editors, compilers, and especially for foreigners who read Chinese. In recent years it has achieved a new usage as a character input system for computers, generating very short lists to browse.

==Origin==

The four-corner method was invented in the 1920s by [[Wang Yunwu]], the editor in chief at Commercial Press Ltd., China. It was based on experiments by [[Lin Yutang]] and others.{{Citation needed|date=April 2007}} Its original purpose was to aid telegraphers in looking up [[Chinese telegraph code]] numbers in use at that time from long lists of characters. This was mentioned by Wang Yunwu in an introductory pamphlet called ''Four-Corner Method'', published in 1926. [[Cai Yuanpei]] and [[Hu Shih]] wrote introductory essays for this pamphlet.

==Mnemonics==

The four digits used to encode each character are chosen according to the "shape" of the four corners of each character.{{clarify|date=October 2021}} In order, these corners are upper left, upper right, lower left and lower right. The shapes can be memorized using a poem composed by [[Hu Shih]], called ''Bihuahaoma Ge'' ({{Lang-zh|t=筆畫號碼歌|p=Bǐhuà hàomǎ gē|labels=no|l=stroke number song}}), as a "[[Mnemonic device|memory key]]" to the system:

{|border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0.5em;margin-left:2em;background:transparent"

|-

!Traditional

Line 49:

In the 1950s, [[lexicographer]]s in the [[People's Republic of China]] changed the poem somewhat in order to avoid association with Hu Shih, who had criticized the [[Chinese Communist Party]], although the contents remain generally unchanged. The 1950s version is as follows:

{|border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="margin:0.5em;margin-left:2em;background:transparent"

|-

!Traditional