There is a diachronic substitution relationship between the commonly used words chang(尝)and ceng(曾),which both express the meaning of"once".In the pre-Qin period,Chang dominated.In the Han Dynasty,with the use of Ceng gradually increased,Chang and Ceng began to compete synonymously.In the Wei and Jin Dynasties,Chang was still dominant in the local literature,but the frequency of use of Ceng in the Buddhist literature was much higher than that of Chang,indicating that Ceng had completed the replacement of Chang in spoken language.It was not until the Tang Dynasty that Chang had been replaced by Ceng in the local written literature.The heavy burden of word meaning,the penetration of dialects into common language and the psychology of users seeking change and innovation are the motivations for the replacement of Chang by Ceng.
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