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The correct rule of tone in fanqie should be "上字辨陰陽，下字辨平仄": The first character determines yin-yang, the second character determines ping-shang-qu-ru. -- Felix Wan 02:03, 2005 May 12 (UTC)
Yeah, but in Middle Chinese there was no yin-yang. Yin-yang arose after Middle Chinese according to the initial consonant, which is why there's such a rule today. -- ran (talk) 18:35, May 28, 2005 (UTC)
I changed the literal translation from "reverse-cutting" to "reverse-correspondence". When 切 has first tone, it does mean cutting. However, here 切 has fourth tone, which has a different meaning, namely "definitely / absolutely (not) / to grind / close to / eager / to correspond to". But it's still not a great literal translation, so if someone can improve, please do. Jbradfor (talk) 03:13, 4 December 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I've added a citation for the literal reading "reverse cut". According to Baxter (1992), p.33, Karlgren translated the term as "turning and cutting". I'm not sure that giving literal readings for the two characters necessarily contradicts it being unclear what the rhyme books meant by using them. Kanguole18:13, 9 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
But the combination "reverse cut" is a translation and not a literal reading for the two characters separately, which would probably be a better solution and eliminate the contradiction.
I don't think it makes sense to translate fanqie literally anyway as it is a modern coinage and is never used in this particular sense in ancient Chinese texts, so it is not possible to determine what 反切 should mean. Without context, I understand it can mean many different things in Old/Middle/Classical Chinese and Karlgren is essentially simply picking one possibility at random. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 01:45, 10 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
To me "literally" does indicate literal readings of the characters, but I agree that it doesn't really contribute to an understanding of the topic. Kanguole11:31, 10 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
My point exactly. "Literally" can mean several things, of course, and the characters can mean different things too. There are already Wiktionary links in the "Origins" section for those who wonder what 反 and 切 might mean, so I think neither a literal translation of 反切 nor separate translations for 反 and 切 are needed, and the existing translation is best removed altogether. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 14:08, 10 November 2013 (UTC)[reply]
