同調異聲──以命輯《滿洲源流考》上諭的三個滿文譯本為例

The Variations in the Same Theme: A Comparative Study on Three Manchu Translations of the Edict About Researches of Manchu Origins

乾隆四十二年，皇帝下令編纂《滿洲源流考》。這道上諭出現多個滿漢文本，相較於漢文本的高度一致，此上諭在滿文《實錄》、滿文《起居注冊》與滿文本《滿洲源流考》的內容卻不盡相同。《滿洲源流考》與《起居注冊》滿文譯文的語句順序及用字均不一致；滿文《實錄》雖與《起居注冊》的語句順序較為一致，但用字仍不同，且其斷句更貼合漢文本《實錄》。這顯示當初纂修滿文《實錄》時，並不照錄滿文《起居注冊》，同時未參考已經成書的滿文本《滿洲源流考》。原因應是滿文本《起居注冊》修纂倉促，《實錄》遂在其基礎上加以修改。滿文是二手文獻，譯者追求貼合漢文本的語意，而不追求滿文文本之間的文字相沿，顯示在文書制度中對傳達文義的要求高於文字的照錄，也因此保留了翻譯者對同一漢文文獻的不同理解，呈現「同調異聲」之態。

In 1777, Emperor Qianlong issued an edict to compile the Researches of Manchu Origins. This edict existed in multiple Chinese and Manchu versions. The Chinese versions were mostly consistent. However, the Manchu versions of this edict as recorded in Veritable Records, Imperial diaries, and Researches of Manchu Origins differed from each other. There is a discrepancy between the Manchu translation of Researches of Manchu Origins and the Manchu translation of Imperial Diaries in terms of wording and sentence sequencing. By comparison, the Manchu translation of Veritable Records and the Manchu translation of Imperial Diaries share largely similar sentence sequencing but not the wording (or the choices of words), and their word grouping and punctuating are more coherent to the Chinese version of Veritable Records. This indicates that the compilation of the Manchu Veritable Records at the time did not entirely duplicate the Manchu Imperial Diaries and did not reference the Manchu Researches of Manchu Origins that had previously been completed. The reasons could be that the Manchu Imperial Diaries was hastily compiled and the Manchu Veritable Records was a result of a moderately modifield version of the Manchu Imperial Diaries. The Manchu translations of the aforementioned texts are a secondary source and the translators place more focus on faithfully conveying the meanings of the Chinese texts than on checking on the semantic connection between the two to follow a consistent choice of words between different versions of Manchu translations. This goes to show that in the narration and documentation system (of the Qing dynasty), there was a higher demand for conveying the semantics and meanings than duplicating the words, which would therefore result in a case of“variations in the same theme”when translators hold discrepant views on the same Chinese text.