Kanbun 漢文

kanbun · from Japanese

What is kanbun?

Kanbun is Classical Chinese as read and written in Japan, often with marks that let readers rearrange it into Japanese word order.

Japanese scholars used reading marks (kunten) to convert Chinese texts on the fly into classical Japanese. Similar practices existed in Korea and Vietnam. Kanbun is still taught in Japanese high schools.

Examples

學而時習之 read as 学びて時に之を習ふ manabite toki ni kore o narau (Analects 1.1); レ点 re-ten (reversal mark)

Kungfucius says: Reading Chinese in Japanese word order: the original machine translation, done by hand.