Central Plains Mandarin

Central Plains Mandarin, or Zhongyuan Mandarin (simplified Chinese: 中原官话; traditional Chinese: 中原官話; pinyin: Zhōngyuán Guānhuà), is a variety of Mandarin Chinese spoken in the central and southern parts of Shaanxi, Henan, southwestern part of Shanxi, southern part of Gansu, far southern part of Hebei, northern Anhui, northern parts of Jiangsu, southern Xinjiang and southern Shandong.

Central Plains Mandarin
中原官话 Zhongyuan Guanhua
Region	Yellow River Plain
Native speakers	(170 million cited 1982)
Language family	Sino-Tibetan Sinitic Chinese Mandarin Central Plains Mandarin
Writing system	Chinese characters, Xiao'erjing (historical)
Language codes
ISO 639-3	–
ISO 639-6	zgyu
Linguist List	cmn-zho
Glottolog	huab1238  Central Plain Guanhua zhon1236  Zhongyuan
Linguasphere	79-AAA-bf
^[image reference needed]

The archaic dialect in Peking opera is a form of Zhongyuan Mandarin.

Among Hui people, Zhongyuan Mandarin is sometimes written with the Arabic alphabet, called Xiao'erjing ("Children's script").

Subdialects

• Zheng-Kai (郑开) region: e.g. Kaifeng (开封) dialect, Zhengzhou (郑州) dialect
• Luo-Song (洛嵩) region: e.g. Luoyang dialect (洛阳话)
• Nan-Lu (南阳) region: e.g. Nanyang (南阳) dialect
• Luo-Xiang (漯项) region: e.g. Zhumadian (驻马店) dialect
• Shang-Fu (商阜) region: e.g. Shangqiu (商丘) dialect, Fuyang (阜阳) dialect
• Xin-Beng (信蚌) region: e.g. Xinyang (信阳) dialect, Bengbu (蚌埠) dialect
• Yan-He (兖菏) region: e.g. Jining (济宁) dialect
• Xu-Huai (徐淮) region: e.g. Xuzhou dialect (徐州话)
• Fenhe (汾河) region: e.g. Linfen (临汾) dialect, Wanrong (万荣) dialect
• Guanzhong region (关中), e.g. Xi'an (西安) dialect
• Qin-Long (秦陇) region: e.g. Xining (西宁) dialect, Dunhuang (敦煌) dialect
• Longzhong (陇中) region: e.g. Tianshui (天水) dialect, Dingxi (定西) dialect
• Hezhou (河州) Region: e.g. Gangou dialect (甘沟话) (influenced by Monguor)
• Nanjiang (南疆) Region: e.g. Yanqi dialect, Tulufan dialect
  • Dungan language, written in Cyrillic, introduced many Russian loanwords, spoken mainly in Chu Valley and Fergana Valley in Central Asia

Phonology

In some varieties of Central Plains Mandarin, some phonological changes have affected certain syllables but not Standard Chinese.

Standard Mandarin's [t͡ʂ], [t͡ʂʰ] and have shifted to [p͜f] before [u]. [ʂ] has shifted to [f] before [u] in some varieties, such as the Yanhe subgroup and the Guanzhong subgroup.

	猪	初	书	熟
Middle Chinese Initial	[ʈ]	[t͡ʃʰ]	[ɕ]	[ʑ]
Pinyin	zhū	chū	shū	shú
Standard Mandarin	[ʈʂú]	[ʈʂʰú]	[ʂú]	[ʂǔ]
Guanzhong Mandarin	[p͜fu]	[p͜fʰu]	[fu]	[fu]

The phenomenon of [p] and [pʰ] being shifted to [p͜f] before [u] and [o] can be found in Linyou (麟游) and Wugong (武功)

	布	跛	坡	朴
Middle Chinese Initial	[p]	[p]	[pʰ]	[pʰ]
Pinyin	bù	bǒ	pō	pǔ
Standard Mandarin	[pû]	[pwò]	[pʰwó]	[pʰù]
Certain varieties of Central Plains Mandarin	[p͜fu]	[p͜fo]	[p͜fʰo]	[p͜fʰu]

See also

• Zhongyuan culture
• Central Plains (China), also called "Zhongyuan"