ABSTRACT
All levels of linguistic analysis threw up elements of Modern Sinitic languages that were absent in Archaic Chinese, but appeared later as a result of independent evolution. The phonetic evolution of Modern Sinitic languages testifies beyond any doubt the kinship of all of these languages. Modern Sinitic languages all descend from one stem. As far as the Sinitic languages are concerned, the major difference is that – in contrast to African languages – all Modern Sinitic languages are doubtlessly genetically linked and that they constitute a linguistic family, which derives from one common mother tongue. In all Sinitic languages prefixed male and female animal names appeared relatively late, much later than the separation of Mandarin and Wu. In some languages the modern form is etymologically clear – such as the Mandarin ta coming from the AC word meaning “other.”
