bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

liveArticle

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

paywallTypes

createdDate

publishedDate

urlAlias

moreOnThisArticles

sponsorType

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

articleSpeeches

socialHeadline

headline

images

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

sponsor

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

Agence France-Presse

It was the language of China’s last imperial dynasty which ruled a vast kingdom for nearly three centuries. But 71 year old Ji Jinlu is among only a handful of native Manchu speakers left.
Traders and farmers from what are now the borders of China and Korea, the Manchus took advantage of a crumbling Ming state and swept south in the 1600s to establish their own Qing dynasty.
Watch: Last words: language of China's emperors in peril

Manchu became the court language, its angular, alphabetic script used in millions of documents produced by one of the world’s pre-eminent powers.
Now after centuries of decline followed by decades of repression, septuagenarian Ji is the youngest of some nine mother tongue speakers left in Sanjiazi village, one of only two places in China where they can be found.
Proud Manchu reclaims his rich heritage
“We mostly speak Chinese these days, otherwise young people don’t understand,” he said, in his sparsely furnished hut beside cornfields, before launching into a self-composed Manchu lullaby.
Manchu is classed as “critically endangered” by the United Nations’ cultural organisation Unesco, which says that half of the more than 6,000 languages spoken worldwide are threatened with extinction, a major loss of knowledge and diversity for humanity.
But schemes to save Manchu are spreading as ethnic consciousness grows among the 10 million-strong minority.
The sign for the village primary school in Sanjiazi, in the northeastern province of Heilongjiang, is in Manchu’s vertical script, with posters in the language written by pupils lining its corridors.
Staring intently at an electronic display, a class shouted the Manchu alphabet, followed by words for “umbrella” and “cow”.
Show offers glimpse into Qing-dynasty China and Hong Kong 145 years ago
But instruction was in Chinese, the everyday language of school life, as were the bellowed lyrics of a song titled: “We are the good Manchu children”.
Teacher Shi Junguang, who painstakingly learned Manchu from older residents and records native speakers before they pass away, wore a red and turquoise robe with gold sleeves reminiscent of the group’s traditional apparel.
We mostly speak Chinese these days, otherwise young people don’t understand
Ji Jinlu, Manchu speaker
But, now, he said, the Manchu “don’t really have any special ethnic characteristics in food or dress”.
“The main thing we have here is the language.”
Under the Qing, or “pure” dynasty, China saw massive territorial expansion before it weakened in the 19th century, assailed by corruption and pressure from European and other foreign powers.
Discrimination against non-Manchu Chinese remained rife and helped fuel a series of rebellions which finally saw the dynasty overthrown in 1911.
Republican leader Sun Yat-sen declared: “To restore the Chinese nation, we must drive the barbarian Manchus back to the Changbai Mountains,” their ancestral homeland.
Many remaining Manchus hid their language, a trend which intensified under Communist leader Mao Zedong, who launched campaigns to eradicate foreign and traditional culture.
At the height of Maoism, “No one spoke the language,” recalled Ji. “It was a time of destroying old culture. Who would dare?”
Political controls relaxed in the 1980s following Mao’s death and Yang Yuan, an ethnic Manchu historian in Beijing, said: “Manchu consciousness has started re-emerging, and now it’s getting stronger and stronger.”
Several universities currently offer Manchu courses and enthusiasts in major cities have formed clubs to study it.
China has launched a massive project to translate Qing documents into modern Chinese, an effort aimed at promoting a view of the dynasty as essentially Chinese.
But the language is also studied by academics abroad, including many in Japan and the US.
Last year overseas historians were branded “splittists” whose work “endangers Chinese unity” in the official journal of the state-run Chinese Academy for Social Sciences, in a sign of official fears over Qing history.
But Harvard University professor Mark Eliot said that teaching Manchu was considered less of a threat by the ruling party than Tibetan or the language of the mainly Muslim Uygur minority as China’s northeastern provinces were now “so firmly welded” into the country that accusations of separatism were implausible.
“That makes Manchu a little bit safer,” he added.
Sanjiazi is “more of symbolic value as the last bastion of Manchu speakers”, Eliot said. “If the effort is to revive Manchu in a way that it would be used in everyday life, I don’t see much chance of success.”
Teacher Shi admitted that his charges only have “some understanding” of the language. Internet savvy young people have little use for it and dream of leaving the remote settlement.
Outside school, a group of blue uniformed children struggled to remember the Manchu word for “goodbye”, one adding in Chinese: “To be honest, our English is better.”
One of the few mother tongue speakers, Meng Xianren, 85, recalled a poverty-stricken youth punctuated by traditional Manchu pursuits, such as rabbit hunting using trained eagles.
Qing emperor Kangxi’s seal fetches HK$81 million at Hong Kong auction
He repeated a Manchu phrase meaning “where are you from?” to 14-year-old Li Kechao, who hovered in his doorway.
She did her best to parrot the question back to the village elder, before admitting: “I don’t understand.”
Spitting on a stone floor, Meng declared: “Manchus once ruled over the Han people. But that time is over”.
“We’ve become like them,” he added with resignation. “There’s no difference.”


Quiet battle to save the dying language of China's last emperors

Children learning Manchu at Sanjiazi school in Heilongjiang province. Photo: AFP

This picture taken on May 4, 2016 shows Meng Xianren, 84 inside the house of his friend Ji Jinlu (not seen) in Sanjiazi village, Heilongjiang province. It was the language of China's ruing Dynasty just a century ago, but now the country's only Manchu speakers are a handful of pensioners in a remote village. Locals are struggling to pass it on amid a extinction which experts forecast could lead the loss of half the word's languages by the end of the century. / AFP PHOTO / NICOLAS ASFOURI / TO GO WITH AFP STORY: China-language-culture-minorities, FEATURE by Tom Hancock

This picture taken on May 4, 2016 shows a plate with the inscription that reads "The manchu language is a living Fossil" in Chinese (down) and Manchu (up) at the Sanjiazi Manchu school in Sanjiazi village, Heilongjiang province. It was the language of China's ruing Dynasty just a century ago, but now the country's only Manchu speakers are a handful of pensioners in a remote village. Locals are struggling to pass it on amid a extinction which experts forecast could lead the loss of half the word's languages by the end of the century. / AFP PHOTO / NICOLAS ASFOURI / TO GO WITH AFP STORY: China-language-culture-minorities, FEATURE by Tom Hancock

News

China

People & Culture

Efforts to ensure the survival of Manchu are spreading as ethnic consciousness grows among the minority group which produced the Qing dynasty


Quiet battle to save the dying language of China's last emperors

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Efforts to ensure the survival of Manchu are spreading as ethnic consciousness grows among the minority group which produced the Qing dynasty

Efforts to ensure the survival of Manchu are spreading as ethnic consciousness grows among the minority group which produced the Qing dynasty