In ancient times, there was no pinyin, so we used reverse cutting, that is, using two words that we can read, taking the first initial and the second vowel and spelling them together.
The Hui brothers in ancient China learned Arabic instead of Chinese characters, but spelled spoken Chinese with Arabic letters, so this is the earliest pinyin in China.
In the Yuan Dynasty, Mongolian rulers spelled Chinese and other languages with Tibetan letters, which were called Basiba characters. Although it is not specialized in spelling Chinese, it is also a kind of Chinese Pinyin.
In the Ming Dynasty, western missionaries spelled Chinese with Latin letters, which was the earliest Latin pinyin in China.
At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, there appeared a phonetic notation way to express Chinese pronunciation with simple ancient characters. During the Republic of China, the government formulated "phonetic symbols", which is the concentrated embodiment of this system. Taiwan Province Province is still in use today. But at the same time, there has also been a phonetic movement of Latin characters, which is closely related to the political movement of the left.
* * * After the establishment of People's Republic of China (PRC), the government immediately formulated the Hanyu Pinyin Scheme, which is now used. The United Nations also recognizes this.