In written language, it is also very close. You can easily understand the novels of Dream of Red Mansions in the middle of Qing Dynasty, not to mention the fact that the late Qing Dynasty lasted until the Republic of China. Needless to say, spoken language is basically vernacular, and classical Chinese is limited to literati. But after all, there are only a few literati, and they are only used to publish official documents. People who usually speak classical Chinese can't understand it, so it's easy to understand the classical Chinese in Qing Dynasty. It's not as difficult as it was in the pre-Qin period. Therefore, if you travel to the Qing Dynasty, you can live, understand and write. But if we travel to the Ming Dynasty, it is basically to tell chickens and ducks what language was spoken in the Qing Dynasty. According to different regions, the main languages in each region are Manchu, Chinese, Mongolian and Tibetan. The royal family and the upper class are mainly Manchu and Mongolian, with a small number of China people; There are more Manchu and Han people among the people.
In the early Qing Dynasty, Manchu was nominally the national language, and later Mandarin became the national language. Due to the relationship between the Ming Dynasty and the Qing Dynasty, which made Beijing its capital, the tone of Nanjing Mandarin was gradually infected by the tones of Beijing dialect and Northern dialect, and over time, the "Northern Mandarin" came into being, which was mainly used by people in Beijing and surrounding areas and had a low status. Therefore, the tone of "Nanjing Mandarin" was still used as the standard pronunciation in the early Qing Dynasty.
Since the Qing Dynasty, Beijing Mandarin has been gradually divided into Nanjing Mandarin and Beijing Mandarin as the standard pronunciation of Chinese. In the early Qing Dynasty, Nanjing Mandarin was still the mainstream standard language of Chinese. In the eighth year of Yongzheng, Andrew Pavilion was established to promote Beijing Mandarin with Beijing accent as the standard. Beijing dialect was formed by adding a few transliterated Manchu words on the basis of the fusion of the old Beiping dialect and Nanjing Mandarin in the Yuan Dynasty (the Ming capital moved northward and more than half of Nanjing people immigrated to Beijing).
By the middle and late Qing Dynasty, Beijing Mandarin gradually replaced Nanjing Mandarin to gain the status of Mandarin. 1909, the "Mandarin Editorial Committee" was formally established, which was the late Qing Mandarin.
Extended data:
In addition to the realization of "Hua Yi Family" in language, we can see the hardships and efforts of the Qing Dynasty to realize the unity of political identity and cultural identity through "A Record of the Righteousness and Family" and "Imperial Decree of the Qing Dynasty".
This process not only enabled the Qing people to complete the identity transformation from "Yi" to "Xia", but also the "Chinese sense of justice" with "Hua Yi clan" as the core further evolved into the value recognition of "Greater China" by non-Chinese worlds such as Mongolia, Xinjiang, Xinjiang and Southwest nationalities, so as to realize "China" in the sense of culture and territory.
China was not dismembered under the impact of the modern western concept of "nation-state", which triggered the integrated response of the "Chinese nation", which not only highlighted the cohesion within the Qing Dynasty, but also highlighted the historical role played by the imperial edict of the Qing Dynasty. These two historical documents, which echoed before and after, formed the main legal basis for China to express his national and territorial demands later.
Reference 1: Baidu Encyclopedia-Mandarin
Reference 2: Baidu Encyclopedia-Qing Dynasty
In fact, the Mandarin of the Tang Dynasty is Cantonese, and costume films are too deceptive. In fact, only the Mandarin of the Qing Dynasty is the modern Mandarin. It is said that Cantonese has inherited most of the tones of ancient Chinese, up to 12 tones, while Mandarin only retains four tones! Perhaps most words in Cantonese still retain the meaning of ancient Chinese. Mandarin also existed in ancient times, but because of the invasion of nomadic people in the north, many foreign words were impure! In fact, all the dialects in the south retain some pronunciation of ancient Chinese, but not as much as Cantonese! To tell the truth, from a historical point of view, it is really unreasonable to say that the purest China people and China people are in the north after China experienced the Five Rebellions and the Song-Nan-Yuan Massacre. As early as the beginning of the 20th century, linguists have come to the conclusion that Guangzhou dialect is closest to Guang Yun (the first mandarin rhyme book in the history of China, the most important updated version of Qieyun in the Tang Dynasty; Although Qieyun has been published for more than 400 years, the phonetic system of Guang Yun is basically the same as Qieyun, but the number of words is greatly increased.
Reading Tang poetry and Song poetry in Cantonese now hardly violates the rules of leveling, which is a strong example, because Cantonese retains more phonological elements of Tang and Song dynasties. In addition, Hakka dialect also calls itself "Millennium Tangyin". Linguistic circles believe that Cantonese and Hakka dialects are closer to the phonology of Tang and Song Dynasties than Mandarin. The official language of the Tang Dynasty is Minnan, and the official language of the Song Dynasty is Cantonese ... The official language of the Ming Dynasty is Wu, and now only the official language of the Qing Dynasty is Mandarin. Who taught you this? The age of Tang and Song Dynasties is too long, and the data and evidence are insufficient. I don't understand or speak. Who told you it was Wu dialect in the Ming Dynasty? The Mandarin of Ming Dynasty was Jianghuai Mandarin and Southwest Mandarin, and it was indeed the Mandarin of Beijing in the middle of Qing Dynasty, which is the embryonic form of Mandarin now.
Can people in the Qing Dynasty speak Mandarin? People in the Qing Dynasty could not speak Mandarin, but they did.
In the early Qing Dynasty, Manchu was nominally the national language, and later Mandarin became the national language. Since the Qing Dynasty, Beijing Mandarin has been gradually divided into Nanjing Mandarin and Beijing Mandarin as the standard pronunciation of Chinese.
In the early Qing Dynasty, Nanjing Mandarin was still the mainstream standard language of Chinese. In the eighth year of Yongzheng, Andrew Pavilion was established to promote Beijing Mandarin with Beijing accent as the standard. Beijing dialect was formed by adding a few transliterated Manchu words on the basis of the fusion of the old Beiping dialect and Nanjing Mandarin in the Yuan Dynasty (the Ming capital moved northward and more than half of Nanjing people immigrated to Beijing).
By the middle and late Qing Dynasty, Beijing Mandarin gradually replaced Nanjing Mandarin to gain the status of Mandarin. 1909, the "Mandarin Editorial Committee" was formally established, which was the late Qing Mandarin.
Extended data:
1. Popularization of Mandarin in Qing Dynasty:
In the Qing Dynasty, the nobles studied and popularized Beijing Mandarin, and during the Yongzheng period, they popularized Mandarin mainly in Beijing dialect areas, and set up "Andrew Library". No matter whether you don't understand or speak Mandarin, you can't take the exam. In A.D. 1909, the Qing Dynasty established the "Editorial Committee of Mandarin", which was officially named Mandarin, and it was widely used at that time. This is the first time that the Qing Dynasty officially named Chinese.
2. Qing dynasty mandarin:
Beijing Mandarin, also known as North China Mandarin, is mainly distributed in Beijing, northern Hebei and central Inner Mongolia, and can be divided into four parts: Shi Jing, Huaicheng, Chaofeng and Shike. User population is about150,000. Three tones and four tones, the ancient entering tone is flat, up and down.