An introduction to the Tangut Homonyms

Abstract This paper discusses a printed edition of a hitherto unknown Tangut linguistic text called Homonyms, which was sold at auction in Beijing in 2014. The book is complete in 14 folios, and comprises two prefaces on three folios; an initial section on two folios showing the cursive forms of sample Tangut characters, ordered by components; and a main section on nine folios which lists 577 groups of homophone characters, listed under head characters that derive from the Tangut books Synonyms and Mixed Characters. The homophone groups do not closely correspond to homophones in other Tangut linguistic texts such as Homophones and Sea of Writing, and so this text may represent the phonetic system for a different dialect or historical stage of the Tangut language