Wu Wu dialect; late Qing Dynasty; interpretation on The Sacred Edict; function words; colloquial words dialect translation of The Sacred Edict was written in colloquial and dialectal Chinese. Function words in the book reflected the lexical and grammatical features in Wu dialect during late Qing Dynasty, including prepositions (ex. Da), modal particles (Lao), negative words (Fu, Wu), etc. This article explores these features through the comparative analysis of the other two editions. Based on the depictions and discussions of function words, the paper provides evidence and supplements for studies on the function words of Wu dialect in the late Qing period.

Spoken words tends to be verbal communication, because the source of the words is different, or for use in different groups, it produced the sound homophones nearly glyph (written symbols) through the synchronical and diachronical spread, which is a spoken word may become phonetic variations occurred in the communication process, and lead to produce multiple variants including the shape of words and the numerous, complicated and changeful usage of words, sometimes even cover up their original real feature. This article focuses on spoken word about the same word but variant character of the oral literature (including abroad), which reflected Beijing dialect in the late Qing and early republic period