John R. Yamamoto-Wilson wrote:
> Smith wrote:

>> I can't imagine Chinese being used in this manner.
> 
> Actually, it has been and still is used in this manner. In the past, Korea,
> Vietnam , Japan and the Ryukyu islands (now part of Japan) all used
> Classical Chinese as a lingua franca, so Koreans talking to Japanese, for
> example, would frequently have used Chinese, much as your Greek and
> Jordanian officials were using English. And Mandarin provides a common
> language between different linguistic/ethnic groups in modern China. The
> scale is regional, not worldwide, but the principle is the same.

I don't think that it was the spoken form that was used for official 
business, it was written.  Remember, if you will the story of ... 
wossname  ... the one who became Tengu, God of Learning, symbol became 
the recumbent cow, and whose main temple is at Dazaifu with famous 
recumbent cow statue in Kyoto ... who wrote all of those poems about 
cherry blossoms ... (I suppose I _could_ Google it, but what fun would 
that be?)

The story goes that he upset the Fujiwaras by refusing to join an 
embassy to Chang-an.  Although he was considered the best writer of the 
classical Chinese memorial form outside China, he was aware that his 
pronunciation was terrible if even existent at all.  Rather than bring 
Japan into disrepute by sounding like a hick or an idiot, he refused to 
go and was punished.

Most of the spoken form was used for trade and was _not_ what they spoke 
in the capital.  From what I have read, China <-> Manchuria <-> Korea 
<-> Japan used the Shandong dialects while China <-> Taiwan <-> Ryukyu 
<-> northern part of Luzon used the Fujian or Hakka dialects.  So when a 
Japanese person offers the "Chinese" reading of something it is unlikely 
to be the standardized Chinese one.

CL