A method for the study of compound words in Chinese

Lexicostatlstical vork usually treats script letters as the basic unit. This Is not suitable for Chinese, »here the basic unit contains a meanln«;, a pronunciation, and a form. The "»ord* ve study Is actually of two signs, so ve must study two-element words. I have tried to find properties that are Independent of form, meaning, and pronunciation, but incline to consider the meaning important when analysis is possible. In a given vocabulary, an element can occur first or second. The number of occurrences before and the number after form a pair that can be represented as a Cartesian point, or as prefer it, a vector. A two-element compound is defined by the line joining POST to HUS, in vector terms POST miinus HUS. I am only beginning to see what the consequences are, but so far a sample of the less common characters gives a good correlation with the rare characters of a new dictionary published in China, even though the ci’iteria for selection ere based only on compounds in my list, and on occurrences in Classical Chinese in the dictionary.