The Ming dynasty said. It is believed that the documents of Yi language only existed in Ming Dynasty (Tang Lan), and its symbol is "the record of documents and the regularity of sentences". Many people hold different opinions on this view. They believe that "when we study the founding period of a national language, we can't take the existing documents as evidence, that is, as far as Chinese language is concerned, we can't infer that Chinese language was founded in Yin according to the earliest existing Oracle Bone Inscriptions year, and we can't take the existing documents of Yi language in Ming Dynasty as the founding period of Yi language". (Ma Xueliang). This view has been denied since Wen Tao, the reclaimed water in Weining, Guizhou Province, was excavated in the 1970s.
On the Yuan Dynasty. This is what the French scholar Henry Cody-Ayre said in his "The Realistic Form of the Luo Nationality": "The Yi people in Dali insist on using the Yi language. A descendant of a Gai Na tribal leader in Malong, Yunnan, wrote an essay Wen, the source of which is unclear, which may have originated from the Yuan Dynasty in history.
The Tang Dynasty said. People who hold this view think that "Jin 'an's translation of the so-called Aunt Tang's calligraphy is reliable" and "it proves that the existing and newly unearthed Yi inscriptions belong to the Ming and Qing Dynasties ... We might as well assume that the Yi language was founded in the Tang Dynasty and concentrated in the Yuan Dynasty" (Chen Shilin, 1984). This theory was also denied because of the discovery of water pottery carvings and the monument to Tua Zhe Jigong.
Theory of Han dynasty. According to the records of Huayang National Records and Southern History, the author thinks that the poem Song of the White Wolf in the Eastern Han Dynasty is "the predecessor of Luoluowen", and infers that "Yi language can be extended to the Eastern Han Dynasty, which shows that the Yi people are also one of the ethnic groups with an ancient civilization in China" (Ma Xueliang, (1993) also thinks that "Yi language originated in the Qin and Han Dynasties and began to take shape at the end of the Han Dynasty".
Banpo said. The symbol of 5 1 pottery unearthed from Anbanpo site in Xi 'an more than 6000 years ago can be read in ancient Yi language. Most Yi scholars and some Han scholars think: "Painted pottery symbols are the ancestors of Chinese characters. It is not only the primitive stage of Chinese characters, but also related to the origin of Yi language "(Yu Hongmo, 1978). "They are descendants of the same family" (Li Qiao, 1983). "The origin of Yi language and Chinese can be traced back to the carved symbols unearthed in Anbanpo, Xi 'an more than 6000 years ago" (Chen Ying, 1980). Yi language has a history of seven or eight thousand years from its original symbols "(Li Jiaxiang, 1992).
There are many symbols on Banpo that are exactly the same or similar to the Yi language, so the mystery of these symbols can be solved by Yi language "(Tian Changwu, 1982). Pottery unearthed in Banpo should be the predecessor of Yi language. It is hard to say that Yi language has nothing to do with Wen Tao unearthed in Banpo. "The Yi language originated from the Yi people's Aibu generation 6,000 years ago, and today's Wen Tao unearthed in Banpo is the predecessor of today's Yi history." Ding Chunshou, 1993.
According to Wan Nian's theory, the main basis of this theory is a batch of inscriptions unearthed in Pengtou Mountain in Lixian County, Hunan Province and Jia Hu in Wuyang, Henan Province in recent years, which can also be interpreted in ancient Yi language. Professor Liu Zhiyi is the first scholar to put forward the theory of permanent history of ancient Yi language. He believes that: "The ancient Yi language has a long history of more than 9,000 years, and if its initial period is added, it may be more than 10,000 years" (19 1), and he calls the ancient Yi language "the ancestor of world characters" (1997). Zhu Yuan, a Yi scholar, also holds this view. The traditional Chinese characters of the Yi people are obviously related to the inscriptions on tortoise shells about 9000 years ago (1993), and the three inscriptions on tortoise shells are also interpreted as "bird", "fortune" and "shrine" in Yi language. Interpret and read the four vertical connection symbols carved on the deed, which are literally translated as "Tianguan" and literally translated as "Tianzhong Doors Open", and infer from this. It is no coincidence that Yi language can interpret Jia Hu's inscription, which can prove that Yi people have a history of civilization of ten thousand years. "
Because the academic circles still hold the view that Chinese civilization has a history of 5,000 years, and put forward the view that the Yi people in China and even the Chinese nation have a history of 10,000 years according to the symbols that Yi people can understand 9,000 years ago, the shock is very great, and many scholars are still skeptical, but so far no one has put forward a strong rebuttal or denial, so when the ancient Yi people began is still inconclusive.