About 也: Easy if you know it!

[Hanlink]

Would anyone happen to know when 也 was first generally used in its meaning of 'also' (亦) in classical chinese prose (古文/文言文). It would seem that in most early classical texts (Mencius etc), it was only used as a function/grammar particle and did not have this adverbial use. However, by the time of the great classics (e.g. 紅樓夢 'Dream of the Red Chamber'), it was being used to mean 'also'.

Any ideas on this would be most appreciated. None of the dictionaries I consulted (many) gave the answer that I need.

Thanks - Hanlink

[studentyoung]

The poem below is written by Liu Yong 柳永 in Song Dynasty.

梦还京

夜来匆匆饮散，欹枕背灯睡。酒力全轻，醉魂易醒，风揭帘栊，梦断披衣重起。悄无寐。

追悔当初，绣阁话别太容易。日许时、犹阻归计。甚况味。

旅馆虚度残岁。想娇媚。那里独守鸳帏静。永漏迢迢，也应暗同此意。

Cheers!

[Hanyu'sWay]

I have seen a few use of 也 as 'also' in some Tang dynasty poems. I have not seen any such examples in literatures before Tang.

Here is example for Skylee (see later posting):

白居易 自咏

闷发每吟诗引兴，兴来兼酌酒开颜。

欲逢假日先招客，正对衙时亦望山。

句检簿书多卤莽，堤防官吏少机关。

谁能头白劳心力，人道无才也是闲。

Edited August 19, 2008 at 12:27 AM by Hanyu'sWay

[xuechengfeng]

The only thing I remember from 文言文 was that (I think) 也 was always at the end of a sentence and functioned as 是 does today, albeit in a different location in the sentence.

[skylee]

I have seen a few use of 也 as 'also' in some Tang dynasty poems. I have not seen any such examples in literatures before Tang.

Could you cite an example?

[Hofmann]

也 is unnecessary. Rather, it explicitly says that the stuff before is true or it means "This is the end of my point."

[skylee]

Re the poem in #4. Yeah I did a text search of 全唐詩 last night and this poem came up.

[Hanlink]

I must thank you all for your replies; some went a little beyond the original query, but that's all part of the beauty of these kinds of forum.

After much careful thought and the fact that nowhere could I come across the development of the character 也 showing the cross-over from classical chinese to literary vernacular, I decided that perhaps I was asking the wrong question or looking at the problem in the wrong way. There are instances of 也 being used in early verse meaning also and these were pointed out, and at the end of the day, verse is probably closer to the vernacular than the classical chinese of the period.

I have basically come to the conclusion that the following is probably correct: in classical chinese (full stop), 也 is used principally as a function character; but with the emergence of vernacular chinese (e.g. the Ming novels), 也 adopts an adverbial use found in earlier poetry. These distinct and different usages continues throughout later centuries with the difference being the medium in which chinese was being written, i.e. either classical or vernacular.

Once again, many thanks for your input.

Hanlink