Which wuxia characters are known to be multilingual?

[Ken Cheng]

Who are the known polyglots of wuxia?

[Ian Liew]

Who are the known polyglots of wuxia?

Do the obvious ones such as Xiao Yuanshan speaking Khitan, Tibetan Monk speaking Tibetan (although he might not have spoken Han, he could understand it) count?

Lu Xiaofeng could speak Mandarin as well as Cantonese, but that's probably a dialect thing (like Huang Rong speaking in Lin An accent).

[Doc Kwok]

Who are the known polyglots of wuxia?

There's your favourite - Guo Jing! Having grown up on the Mongolian plains, he was completely fluent in the Mongolian language, and used it all the time while in Mongolia, speaking Chinese only with his mother and teachers. By contrast, the Mongolians generally didn't know any Chinese, so there was little interaction between them and the Han characters in the LOCH novel (unlike in TVB's LOCH '82...).

[tape]

The fourth Wudang hero knew Mongolian I believe.

[Dragon Heiress]

IIRC, Huang Rong knows sign language if that counts.

[PJ]

Zhu Ziliu knew Hindi (or whatever language the Indian monk spoke).

[Dragon Heiress]

Whoever read the Sanskrit parts of 9yin and 9yang manuals should know Sanskrit, right?

[PJ]

Qian Tongsi (BXJ) speaks Portuguese.

[Ken Cheng]

Do the obvious ones such as Xiao Yuanshan speaking Khitan, Tibetan Monk speaking Tibetan (although he might not have spoken Han, he could understand it) count?

Sure, why not?

[Ken Cheng]

Lu Xiaofeng could speak Mandarin as well as Cantonese, but that's probably a dialect thing (like Huang Rong speaking in Lin An accent).

I sort of wonder if Luk Siu Fung was a native of Guangdong province? Not only does he speak Cantonese, but Guangdong was the first location that came to his mind when he talked with the Four Imperial Guards about getting witnesses to testify that he was elsewhere (not the Forbidden City) that day.

[Trien Chieu]

Yeung Hong and Wanyan Hong Lik speak both mandarin and Jin's language.
Kangxi, Qianlong and qing officials speak both mandarin and manchu language.
Princess Fragrance and her sister speak both mandarin and xinjiang language.
THe persians from HSDS speak both their native language and mandarin.

[Ken Cheng]

Qian Tongsi (BXJ) speaks Portuguese.

Might be the only Chinese character in wuxia to speak a European language.

[pannonian]

There's your favourite - Guo Jing! Having grown up on the Mongolian plains, he was completely fluent in the Mongolian language, and used it all the time while in Mongolia, speaking Chinese only with his mother and teachers. By contrast, the Mongolians generally didn't know any Chinese, so there was little interaction between them and the Han characters in the LOCH novel (unlike in TVB's LOCH '82...).

The Jiangnan Freaks were also fluent in Chinese and Mongolian.

Edit: Yideng knew both Chinese and Sanskrit, as shown when he translated the Sanskrit portion of 9 yin.

[sarakoth]

Might be the only Chinese character in wuxia to speak a European language.

WEI XIAO BAAOOO

Also, I swear there's this exact same thread/list of chars floating around some where.

[odbayarb2000]

yep there were other thread.

[Dragon Heiress]

WEI XIAO BAAOOO

Also, I swear there's this exact same thread/list of chars floating around some where.

What does WXB speak? I'm not too familiar with DOMD.

[sarakoth]

What does WXB speak? I'm not too familiar with DOMD.

Russian. 10char

[Ken Cheng]

Russian. 10char

Did he ever become fluent, or did he basically speak "tourist Russian?"

[sarakoth]

Did he ever become fluent, or did he basically speak "tourist Russian?"

I think he was pretty instrumental in negotiating peace terms with the Russians after the miniwar.

[Dirt]

Pretty much anybody who traveled in Jiang Hu had to know just about every dialect known to the Central Plains. Only the Mandarins spoke Mandarin.