Questing about orthography (spelling)
A question, the answer to which has long eluded me:
Why do some branches of Wing Chun spell it Ving Chun?
- When neither Mandarin nor Cantonese have the voiced labiodental fricative /v/ sound?
They both have the approximant glide /w/, and the voiceless labiodental fricative /f/, but both languages notably lack the voiced /v/.
So where did the name "Ving Chun" come from?
I can understand the Chun-Tsun difference, because "ts" is how Cantonese regularly spells the sound /tsʰ/, which is very close to English "ch", /ʧ/
But I have no idea whence V...
All thoughts appreciated. Thanks.
^(Edit: I didn't notice until I posted that my phone had autocorrected "Question" to "Questing". And now I can't edit the post title. Sorry. Just imagine I'm a plucky young farmboy of mysterious parentage, on a noble and dangerous journey to find the answer. I have no doubt I'll need a sword, because all good quests need swords.)